Twilight - Wanderland
by runramsey
Summary: Bella Swan is a journalism student studying at Columbia University. Edward Cullen is a detective for a special section of the NYPD. Children are disappearing in the city and Bella has immersed herself in solving the mystery. Edward seeks the same monster. With the help of her friend Jacob Black, Bella begins to put the pieces of the puzzle together. But time is running out...
1. Chapter 1

2.5 million men, women and children are currently being trafficked against their will.

_2300 people go missing every day in the U.S. _

_900,000 a year._

_Nearly 100 children a year are reported missing by abduction. Most are never found…_

_The five Boroughs that make up New York City inhabit 8,214,426 people._

_Manhattan is home to 1,611,581. _

_The island of Manhattan is 13.4 miles long. At its widest point it is 2.3 miles wide. In total the island is approximately 23.7 square miles._

The boy lay in the darkness, huddled and shivering in the cold dirt. He didn't know how long he'd been there. He couldn't remember how he'd gotten there. He only lay there curled into himself and listen to the soft sound of his own breathing. Often he heard noises. Low wary thumps as of someone moving about in the blackness. Hovering. Savoring him. And then the quickening of his own breath. In this kind of darkness your mind played games.

Sometimes his mother sang to him. Sweet songs he begged her not to sing because he thought he was too old. Yet here they were, blindly comforting him. _Mothers are like angels_, he thought. _Did God in heaven know the Devil was the Keeper of the earth?_

The boy whimpered and cried. He cried until there was nothing left but the exhaustion of his shuddering soul. _Did God here him now?_

His stomach tightened and spoke. He dreamt of milk, rich and cold. Sweetened by puffs of cereal and marshmallows. The boy opened his eyes to the surprise of a shaft of pale blue light. Beautiful and so heavenly he involuntarily convulsed. It cast down across the crawlspace and exposed his filthy bare legs. The boy pulled himself up against the dirt wall and brought his knees into his chest.

'Please… I won't tell,' he shivered.

The wisp of light dissolved in the shape which crouched before him, ghosting into a pallid haze around the figure's shoulders and head. Reflected blue veins of an indecent hand reached forth and gently stroked the boy's arms. The boy trembled violently and urinated through his Spider-man Underoos.

'Please… I miss my mama… Please don't hurt me…'

The dark figure passed into the light and went up through the opening of the crawlspace. There was no sound save the beating of the boy's heart. He began to softly cry. The bluish light from above fizzled and vanished. The boy shuddered in the cold dark. He pulled his thin legs closer. He thought of a fluffed snowman pillow his mother had once made to comfort him. The smooth softened fabric with the colorful print and animation of a blue vest and black top hat and orange carrot for a nose. She had lovingly stuffed it with his treasured blankets. He remembered the warm smell when squeezed. It smelled like her. Like them. Now he had forgotten where it was. He searched his mind but it was lost to him. He thought maybe it still carried his smell. As if a part of himself might still exist outside of his darkness. _Maybe she still had it… him_, he thought, and then he felt the sudden warmth of rusted stale breath on his face.


	2. Spuyten Duyvil, Bronx

Special Detective Edward Cullen stood at the edge of _the_ _hump_ and peered down to the deep waters of the Harlem River below. The 'C' Rock had always been a favorite thrill for those seeking adventure within the confines of the city. Legends always had a way of taunting new generations. Especially when it came to feats. It was a fifty foot drop to the river below. Many a boy or girl for that matter had backed away from nerves. Like anything else in this life it was simply a test.

Edward sniffed at the autumn air. Stale and dying. Scent of the deciduous trees. The sun was setting across the river against the backdrop of a darkening city. He stared into the wan shafts of light. He stared until the light finally blinded him. But it was too late. _Too late,_ he thought. Images burned his mind and paled away. Broken images of memories long past. Another life was how he liked to think of it. A spark of life short-lived. Like a piece of aerolite swiftly burning through the atmosphere. Now he simply functioned out of the curiosity that the dead muscle in his chest was still able to beat.

The Harbor Patrol glided under the Henry Hudson Bridge and drifted toward the wall of rock with the giant 'C' painted on it. The police boat slowed and spun the bow around to face the oncoming tide. A short Spaniard with yellowed curls of hair stepped in beside Edward and shook his head. He wasn't as young as Edward but his paled complexion did a decent job of concealing his experience.

'A couple of boys from Riverdale found it. Said it was just floating there. Lodged against the wall.' Sgt. Alonzo Clemente took out a brown cigarillo and placed it in his mouth. 'Looks like it's been there awhile,' he said, lighting the small cigar.

The boat below drifted in the flow of the tidal wake, slowly moving closer to the edge of jagged wall. Three officers scrambled around the side of the boat and worked off the rock as the other two pulled the body from the river. Clemente's radio crackled with static.

'It's a boy Sergeant. Probably around ten years of age. Has some bruising around his neck and shoulders and ribcage.'

Clemente looked at Edward. He sighed and shook his head. 'These things happen. His friends probably dared him to jump and he landed wrong. If he hit that water face first it could've knocked him unconscious… drowned. That also might explain the bruising.'

'This river moves at about four knots with tides flowing from the north and the south. Wouldn't he drift away?' Edward said.

'Not necessarily. There's a tidal surge down there. Once the boy was pulled toward the wall, the current moved around him and just held him there. You know why they call this place Spuyten Duyvil?'

'Spinning Devil,' Edward said, still peering down the face of the rock into the stream of black water.

'That's right. They call it the Devil's Whirlpool. In1666 the British Navy was going to invade the island. The city. A man named Anthony Van Corlaer was ordered to summon the people of the island. When he reached the Harlem River it was storming and he couldn't cross. He decided to swim. They say the Devil drowned him. Pulled him under. It wouldn't be the first time a boy has drowned down there.'

Clemente's radio popped and beeped.

'Sergeant, we got something… unusual.' There was a break between the static and charge of wind stirring across the river, '… the boy's tongue is gone.'

'What do you mean it's gone?'

'The boy doesn't have a tongue, Sir… it's gone.'

'Por Dios,' Clemente winced and then quickly made the sign of the cross. He held the radio to the left of his mouth and spoke. 'Okay. Let's get him down to the medical examiner and see if we can identify him.' He looked down at his watch and cursed with a hiss. 'Damn. I'm going to be late again…'

Edward removed his long lambskin coat and folded it into quarters and handed it over to Clemente. He watched the boat drift with the changing current as he moved closer to the edge. Clemente reached out and grabbed Edward by the fold of his arm and pulled him back.

'What the hell are you doing, man?'

Edward smirked. He observed the oily shine of Clemente's hair and paper skin against the fading light. Vitamin E, lots of it because of his condition.

'Going for a swim.'

'Look detective. My men and I will do a full investigation. If this turns out to be your missing boy, we'll notify you immediately. Then we'll hit the streets. I'll have my best men on this. Okay? No messing around…' Clemente dropped his cigarillo and held out Edward 's coat for the taking.

Edward drew close and looked the paper Sergeant in his pink albino eyes. He had a feeling Clemente was a veteran that didn't quite make the grade. Always jockeying. 'I need to get a closer look.'

'Tonto de remate!' Clemente hissed and tightened his grip. 'You crazy?'

Edward shook his head and blinked. 'Yeah.' The dark waters invited him. He pulled his arm away from Clemente's hold and looked toward the setting sun and stepped off the edge of _the hump_.


	3. East Side Hospital, Manhattan

The young woman sat in an uncomfortable chair in the trauma ward of East Side Hospital. She touched her mother's frail hand and forced a smile.

'Hi mom. You look so pretty today… your hair is golden.' The afternoon sun shone through the hospital windows alchemizing the patches of her lengthy white hair. It was as close to its original blonde as it would ever get.

A tear swelled in the corner of the girl's eye. 'I miss our walks together. I've been lost without you. I'll probably put on fifty pounds now that I don't have anyone to walk with,' she softly laughed, 'can you imagine that? Bunnie would never let me hear the end of it. She… she sends her love,' the girl said quietly.

Isabella Swan held her breath as the wet in her eyes broke and streamed down her cheeks. Her mother had had an Ischemic stroke a month before. When Bella found her lying on the floor of her sewing room it was too late. She buckled from the shock. Her mother's hair had gone white almost overnight. She had never felt as helpless and fragile as at that moment. It was a facet of fear she had never experienced before. The doctors operated to reduce the swelling but the clot had already done its worst. Now her mother lay in a Persistent Vegetative State. Occasionally, she smiled or blinked or moved her head toward Bella 's voice, but otherwise she was completely void of emotion. She would most likely be this way for the rest of her life.

Bella wiped away the streaks of ruined mascara and rested her head against her mother's thin arm. Her mother stared absently away toward the ceiling. How had it come to this? Renée Swan had been a rock. For as long as Bella could remember her mother had been an influential figure. Leading the charge against whatever injustice found its way into the community. She was outspoken and brash and headstrong. She had taken on the school administration and the city council over district zoning conflicts. Pushing them to the brink with her effective legal expertise. They eventually would fold, as all of them did. She was admired for her pursuits. These things, however, couldn't hold a candle to the wellbeing of her only daughter. Renée was in her forty-second year when she became pregnant with Bella. As unconventional as it may have seemed, she was inspired by the gift she had received. She had been aware of the risks. She had almost died during childbirth. Excessive hemorrhaging from the uterine wall. Bella knew this because her mother had told her so. It had been engrained in her how much they meant to each other. The deep bond they shared. Now it seemed the tables had finally turned. Bella was forced to be the rock. She had no choice in the matter.

The last of the day's light graced the two women. Bella had rested in its fading glow for three hours stroking her mother's hand. Sitting there. Listening to the soft beeps of her monitors. Unable to find the words.

'I have to go, mom,' she nodded. She placed her mother's hand across her abdomen. The G-tube (gastric feeding tube) protruded from her mother's side and Bella adjusted it away from her hand and pushed it back under the layers of thin hospital blankets.

'I love you. I'll be back tomorrow.'

She stood and kissed her dear mother on her head and left the room and went to the elevator. These comings and goings were wearing on her. She felt as if time was at a standstill and simultaneously she felt like she had aged twenty years.

The life of the city jolted her as she stepped through the sliding doors onto First Ave. and headed for the subway station at 28th Street. It seemed surreal to feel so quieted and lost in the small room that held her mother. As if she was sharing a space with something inevitable. Something she wasn't quite ready to face. Now she was back flowing among the weave of busybodies moving about the city. Shuffling together inside the subway. Moving along the platform and forcing their way onto the train like salmon fighting to get upstream.

At 116th Street and Broadway she got off the 1 train and climbed the grated steps and came out on the sidewalk adjacent to the journalism building at Columbia University. Twenty feet ahead was the 116th street entrance known as College Walk. She rushed along the sidewalk and went under the tall iron gates of College Walk and jogged along the back of the journalism building. She was late. She was aware she would most certainly be reprimanded.

Bella went up the front steps of Journalism Hall, as it was aptly called, and hurried through the front doors and down the main hall to Professor Rice's class. As soon as she opened the door she realized it would have been better not to have shown at all. The class was empty. Professor Rice stood over his darkened podium gathering a cluster of papers. He looked up as she entered.

'Hello, Miss Swan,' Professor Rice spoke languidly with a slight British accent. His tone was dry, as if he had been chewing on a lemon rind. He angled his watch. 'You're early.'

'I'm sorry Professor Rice.'

'Sorry? Why? You were only one of fifteen graduates chosen for this program. Granted, you are well beyond the rest. But don't let that go to your head. Even prodigies fall from grace. Discipline is your weakness. You still need guidance. Although, how much is really up to you.'

'I know,' she nodded.

'I know you do, Bella. You, above all, have the ability to one day be great. And I will take gratitude in knowing I was a mentor and colleague, if you will,' Professor Rice gave a subtle flat smile. He gathered his things and placed them under his arm and headed for the door. 'Well, if there isn't anything else.'

'Actually…'

Professor Rice passed by her and smiled curiously with his eyes. 'Walk with me.'

They entered the main hall and went up the back stairwell to the second floor and headed for his office. Bella hurried along beside him. For an older man he was wiry and agile and freakishly strong.

'I take it something is troubling you.'

'Yes. I don't know quite how to put it. It feels like I'm slowly being consumed… eaten. Can an investigator get too close to their story… become too involved?'

They entered Rice's office. He sat down behind his desk with a solvent air and offered Bella a seat with the open passing of his arm. She sat down in a velvet wingback chair before him and crossed her legs.

'Clearly, you're speaking of the project you've been surreptitiously working on.'

Bella softly nodded.

'Certainly there are limitations. There must be some ability to detach one's self from their work, however dire or corruptible. It is your job to find truth. Simply put. Henry R. Luce once said, _I became a journalist to come as close as possible to the heart of the world_.'

He paused and took a small bottle of cloves from his desk, removing the lid and shaking one into his palm. He placed the dried clove in his mouth and continued.

'I completely agree with that statement. However, what may be and what is can be two very different things. The real question is… How far down the rabbit hole are you willing to go? And when you arrive… will you be prepared for what you are about to receive. Will you have the resolve? Anyone can speculate, you see, that is one of mankind's most supreme flaws. You have to dig deep within yourself and even then you won't really know what it is you will find until you are face to face with _it_. Whatever _it _may be. There is no reward without risk.'

Bella nodded. 'Yes. But I'm, I'm afraid that doesn't answer my question.'

Rice cleared his throat and sat forward. 'You want something definite. A guarantee. What are you truly seeking?'

'Will it… could it, steal my soul?'

Rice leaned back in his chair and studied Bella and then his mouth pursed into a thin grin. His eyes darkened. 'It's a little late for that,' he said dryly.


	4. 121st Street and 3rd Ave, Harlem

Bella lay in her bed staring up at the shadow-cast ceiling. Images moved and entwined like a ghosted kaleidoscope. She couldn't sleep. In fact, she barely ever slept. It didn't help that she lay there unsatisfied while the warm body next to her grunted and purred with ingratitude. She knew Mike was seeing other women in the city. _Seeing… _she softly laughed to herself. Why did she try to sugarcoat something so obvious? He was screwing them. Period. This didn't bother her. She wasn't going to marry Mike. She only wondered if they were as unfulfilled as she was. Then again…

Bella looked at the clock and sat up. 3 A.M. She slid from her bed and crossed her studio apartment and sat down amid the clutter she called a desk. Filings. Clippings. Books upon more books. It was a mass of disorganization only she could contend. She opened her laptop and pulled her long dark hair back into a clip. The click of a lighter crossed the open room. She smelled the smoke before it was even lit.

'Mike. Please. This place will stink for days.'

'Working again?' he said snidely. 'I don't know why you just don't drop out of Columbia and write a book already. Go your own way. You're doing too well as a freelancer,' he said stamping out his fresh cigarette.

'I've told you a hundred times… connections. You play the game, get cozy with the insiders. It's a tradeoff. They're an integral part of my work. '

'Connections… connections… she says. Listen, I'm going to be very wealthy soon, then you'll have all the connections you need.'

'That doesn't say much for my credibility.'

Mike Newton rose from the bed and came to her and put his hands on the cusps of her small shoulders. He thumbed the flesh of her back and firmly rubbed up and down the nape of her long neck.

Bella paused. 'I don't know if I can do this anymore.'

'Don't sound so sad. This is life. How would you have it? To be a shadow of your true self. We have a good thing.'

Bella grunted. '… No, we don't.'

'You don't really believe that,' he smiled. 'Is this because of my business again?'

Bella softly shook her head and tilted her head away in a disconcerting manner. 'No. Of course not. What you do is your business. Insider trading is illegal, Mike. You're a fool if you believe anything else.'

Mike chuckled. 'It's only illegal if you get caught. Christ… half of the politicians in D.C. invest like crazy and they get away with it. Our entrusted elected officials,' he smirked.

'Congress passed a bill to stop that.'

'Please. I personally know of a few that invest on privileged information. You think it's a coincidence that a congressman making a hundred and seventy thousand a year somehow parlays that into millions? The money they take from lobbyist alone. '

'You're not a politician.'

'Not yet. Wall Street was practically built on insider trading. Only it isn't called insider trading… it's called having _connections_,' he quietly grinned and pinched her cusp's with conviction. 'Speaking of which, what time is it?'

Bella lulled and rolled her neck. 'Three ten.'

'Perfect. The London exchange just opened.' He leaned down and softly kissed her in curve of her neck. 'I'm going to go… Cherie.'

Her cheekiness softened. 'Adieu,' she breathed.

Mike crossed the room and got dressed. He was already on his cell when he closed the door behind him. Bella sighed and rubbed her temples. _What am I doing?_ She had known Mike was a mistake the moment she had met him. He was a loose cannon. An opportunist who took shortcuts. He was charming and attractive and that enabled him to slip through doors that would have normally been closed to others. Including hers. It made her cringe to think how weak she was.

She thumbed through the stack of documents before her and then she pushed them aside and furrowed. Distracted. It was true what Mike had said. She had had several pieces published by the _Post_ and the _Daily News_. A few national magazines. One piece by the _Times_. This wasn't enough to qualify her for any position she wanted. Granted… she wanted her terms. She knew she couldn't freelance forever. There were a thousand applicants vying for a position in the mailroom. Graduates fresh out of Columbia and Harvard had more of a chance winning a Pulitzer than getting a job with the _Times_.

Bella breathed easy and rested her forehead against the palm of her trembling hand. She stared at the reflection of herself in her blank computer screen. Her mother's soft face stared back from thirty years ago. Lovingly. Her eyes glassed over. Sirens cried and passed through the streets below. She shook it off and turned on her laptop and pulled up her email and checked her messages.

_Crap… crap… more crap_.

She found an email near the bottom that read… WAKE UP BELLA ! URGENT!

The file opened.

_**Bells… got something **__**HOT**__**! Call me as soon as you get this, Jake.**_

Bella filed through the clutter on her desk and found her cell. She opened her contacts and dialed Jacob Black. The phone rang once and went to voicemail.

'Shit!'

She hung up and dialed again. The phone rang… _five, six, seven, eight_.

A voice groggily answered. 'Hello.'

'Jacob. Wake up,' she barked.

'Good morning to you, Bella,' he yawned. 'What time is it?'

'A little after three. I just opened your email. What have you got?'

'Uh… hold on.' There was some shuffling and a loud repetitive banging that reminded her of the inside of a restaurant kitchen in Korea Town. Then some lurching and the low bellow of Jacob purging himself into something.

_Jesus…_

'Sorry… one of those things, you know.'

'Feel better?'

'Not really.' The sound of a lighter clicked. Jacob exhaled. 'Uh okay, I received a call earlier. I know you've been following the reports on missing children in the city, so I thought of you first. It happens they found a boy in the Harlem River today. The one that went missing a few weeks ago.'

'Joseph Mackenzie.'

Jacob breathed hard over the phone and coughed. 'Right. Joseph Mackenzie. They found him in his dirty underwear floating beneath the 'C' Rock.'

'Oh God,' she breathed.

'Yeah. It'll be in the Times and the Post tomorrow. I'm surprised your boy from the Times didn't give you a heads up.'

'He's in Washington,' she said blankly.

'So… they'll give their usual hedonistic spread. Lay it all out. Only there's one thing they won't know,' Jacob paused and breathed slow, letting the moment resonate, 'the boy's tongue was cut from his throat.'

Bella was quiet. She ached. The waves of shock swelled into anger.

'Hey kid… you alright?'

'Yeah,' she spoke softly. An electric spider tickled somewhere inside her. Spreading. Dangerously. 'How did you find this information out?'

'A little bird. A sparrow actually.'

Bella exhaled through the phone and then she sparked. 'I'll bet my ass he's still at the OCME. They're not going to let any press near him. I don't give a damn about the story, Jake. I have to see this boy. I have to know what happened to Joseph Mackenzie. Can you get me in?'

Sounds of Jacob swallowing something quickly. 'Is your ass really on my line?'

'C'mon Jacob…'

'I'm just saying…'

'Jake?'

'What do you think?' he breathed.

'What would I do without you?'

'You'd probably live out some mundane life as a mediocre writer for the local rag of whatever town you ended up in. Preferably something Amish. You could churn butter on the side. You'd be good at that. Up and down. That's the best I got.'

Bella eased and softly laughed. 'Really?'

'Or starve. Your choice,' Jacob joshed and coughed unhealthily.

'I owe you,' she smiled through her words.

'Yes you do. Big time.'


	5. Office of the Chief Medical Examiner

Heavy mist swirled through the early morning. Curling and tailing. Clouding the city block and buildings like some encumbering phantom. As if by chance a blind warning sent through a celestial bearer of some kind. It hadn't even occurred to her that her mother was less than a block away. Bella exited her cab against the paling gusts and crossed a quiet First Ave. She moved quickly down East 26th between Hunter College and the OCME. The street was lined with ambulances and emergency vehicles. The white stone of the Chief Medical Examiner building darkened and loomed as she passed and stopped at its tall glass doors. In the daylight the building had given a warm feeling. Promise maybe. It seemed a distant shadow before dawn. She pushed the call button and waited.

'Yes?' a voice trilled and scratched over the intercom.

Bella drew back the dangling strands of her dampened hair and pushed the call button. 'Hi. Isabella Swan. I'm here to see the Deputy Medical Examiner, Dr. Taylor.'

'One moment please.'

The door buzzed and clicked and she pulled it open and walked through the lobby to the front desk. A younger black woman sat watching her and slid a tablet and pen across the desk toward her.

'You have to sign in.'

'Okay.' Bella smiled. She signed her name and then the girl directed her around the partition.

'Go on back to the main autopsy room. Dr. Taylor is expecting you.' The girl seemed distant. Complacent. She took the tablet from Bella and then paid her no mind. Bella stepped into the turnstile and walked back through the dimly-lit stretch of hall. A feeling crept inside like a faint whisper. A telling she couldn't comprehend but felt in her bones. This place would become very familiar. Goosebumps raised the hairs on the back of her neck.

She held her breath. As if this action would suppress the swell of anxiety surging through her. She exhaled and wiped at her eyes. Ahead, a young man in an expensive-looking coat came out of the autopsy room and walked down the hall toward her. He appeared tired and ragged. She looked into his glassy, reddened eyes and immediately knew he hadn't been crying. Bella stopped in front of the door to the autopsy room and glanced back at this magnetic presence. _Strange_.

She pulled the door open and entered the spacious room. It was not what she had expected. The room was dim and sterile and there was no collection of random fresh corpses, tagged and covered on rows and rows of gurneys. In the middle of the room was one long stainless table with wheels and the boy lay uncovered across its cold metal surface. Pale and hauntingly thin. Still in his dirty gutchies. Still scared. _Joseph Mackenzie_. A small woman in a white lab coat came out from the back and gestured to Bella. She spooned Greek yogurt from a small cup.

'Hello,' the woman smiled.

'Hi. I'm Isabella Swan. Dr. Taylor?'

'Yes. Come in. I've been expecting you.'

Bella walked closer toward the table. 'Thanks for seeing me on such short notice,' her eyes rapidly trailed from the boy to Dr. Taylor and back.

'You're younger than I expected. I was assured you weren't with the press. I was given explicit instructions to embrace your presence with alacrity. I'm not being hoodwinked here am I?'

Bella shook her head. 'No. That isn't the case at all. I'm here because of the boy… because of Joseph,' she paused. 'Where are the other bodies?'

Dr. Taylor nodded. 'I moved them to another room for now. I wanted to be alone with this one.'

'Yes,' Bella said watching the boy. 'He's so thin. So thin.'

'Poor thing weighs a little over thirty pounds. Of course, most of his blood is gone. I imagine that happened when his tongue was removed. Hemorrhaging from the severing of the ranine artery. It's worse with children.'

'My God.' Bella moved next to the boy and gently touched his matted hair. 'This wasn't a drowning…'

Dr. Taylor dropped the yogurt into the waste tin and handed Bella a pair of surgical gloves. 'No. This boy was starved and abused. Tortured.'

'How can you be sure?' Bella put on her gloves.

'There are obvious signs of malnutrition… physical abuse,' she pointed to the bruising around the boy's arms and neck, 'I believe he was still alive when his tongue was removed.' Dr. Taylor opened the boy's mouth and shone a small halogen light against his teeth. 'A few of his teeth are chipped… there on two of the molars and behind his front teeth. Possibly from struggling against whatever tool was used.'

'Someone did this to him.' Bella felt lightheaded.

'Undoubtedly. Personally, I've never seen anything quite like it. I've heard about these types of cases, but have never been face to face with one.'

Bella looked away. She shook her head. 'Was he sexually abused?'

'Not that I could see. It would be pretty clear if he was, however, I haven't gotten that far into the autopsy yet. Don't rule out anything. There are no absolutes without scientifically examining him first.'

'Does his mother know?'

Dr. Taylor shook her head. 'It's probably better she doesn't. From what I understand she didn't take his discovery very well. His uncle had to identify the boy. It's hard to imagine the realization of your worst nightmare.'

Bella mechanically nodded. She suddenly felt very lost.

'Well, will there be anything else?'

Bella paused and shook her head. 'I… I don't know.' She reached out and touched Joseph's small hand. She looked back at Dr. Taylor.

'Are you okay?'

Bella slowly walked around the table. 'Did you find anything unusual? Anything out of the ordinary?'

'Other than his tongue being literally ripped from his hyoid bone?'

'Please… if someone is doing this they can be stopped. I'm just trying to help.'

Dr. Taylor nodded and looked over at Joseph. 'I understand. If you're looking for some kind of a clue, I don't think you're going to find anything obvious. This boy was held against his will and starved and then he was murdered. The only thing I can tell you is that in my gut, I don't think he was supposed to be found.'

Bella removed her gloves and dropped them in the waste tin. 'Thank you.'

Dr. Taylor watched Bella and breathed deep. 'After I complete my autopsy and forensics has their way… maybe something will come up. I wouldn't be surprised if the FBI gets involved, too. This isn't like television where they solve every crime in an episode. These things take time. Sometimes years. Listen, if I happen to find anything unusual I'll let you know, okay?'

Bella nodded. 'Thank you, Dr. Taylor.'

'Okay. If I can be of any more help to you let me know. I have a feeling this won't be the last time we see each other.'

Bella softly smiled. 'I have a feeling you're right. Do you mind if I have a moment with him?'

'I don't see why not.' Dr. Taylor gave a vacant glance and went into the back room and shut the door.

Bella moved around the boy. She grazed her fingertips along the boy's face and closed her eyes. _Tell me what to do and I'll do it… _

She opened the door and walked out into the hall. The door quietly latched shut and she suddenly felt drawn to stay with the boy. The thought of him being trapped somewhere cold and dark crippled her. As if it was an unspoken destiny. Forever bonding his broken innocence. She rushed away from the autopsy room and came through the exit to the lobby and stopped at the front desk.

'Can I see the sign-in sheet?'

The girl behind her desk gave Bella a frustrated glare.

'Please,' Bella breathed.

The girl slid the tablet over to her. Bella drew her finger to the line above where she had signed in. _Edward Cullen._ She laid the tablet down and slowly turned and sauntered toward the front. When she reached the front doors she could see the graying shadows had lightened and the sky was going all ashen and yellow. The sun was set to rise.


	6. Chinatown

The streets between Worth and Allen were busy. Always busy. Even at 2:30 in the morning. Parts of the city never slept, as the saying goes. Chinatown was one of them. Edward walked up Mott Street and stopped in front of the Big Wang King Restaurant. Young Asian men stood around the storefront, smoking and talking. Soy and sugar and the fumes of cooking sesame oil worked his insides into a ball. Chinese food smelled old world. A rooster crowed.

Beside the restaurant was a pagoda with a plain-blue awning. The pagoda spilled over the sidewalk with dozens of New York City t-shirts and rattan floor mats. Between the two establishments was a set of stairs leading down into the underbelly of the street. Edward went down the steps and opened the barred door with a big _Welcome_ sign taped between the bars.

'We're closed!' a sharp voice squawked.

'Hello Sue,' Edward smirked as he walked through the shadows of long tapestries and bronzed statues. He wandered to the back of the small underground shop. It smelled of spice and anise and burning musk.

'Well well, Mr. Cullen… you look bad. You having the headaches again? You know I have special cure for that.' Sue rubbed down the side of her body and back up cupping her breast.

Edward smiled. 'We tried that Susie.'

Sue laughed. 'You're the only Vampire I like. You know that?' She went into the back and came out with a handful of bloodred pouches and set them on the counter. 'Clean blood. American. Best deal in Chinatown.'

Edward picked up a pouch and examined it and set back down on the counter. 'How much?'

'For you… three hundred. That's a good price.'

Edward watched her eyes. The rims of her irises were a pale green like water feeding a shoal and then they went dark and deep as the sea. He looked at the pouches and then back to Sue. 'Okay.'

'Good. I have virgin blood, too,' she smiled.

'It's not that Thai shit?'

'No way! Very rare… you will like, I guarantee. If not you come see me, we'll work something out,' she winked.

'Alright,' Edward nodded. 'Always a happy ending with you, Sue.' He fished a cigarette from his coat and lit it.

'You better believe it,' she laughed open-mouthed. She went into the back and disappeared. Her voice was distant as she spoke. 'I like you Edward. I like you a lot… for a vampire.' She came back out to the front and set a small brown vial on the countertop.

'I appreciate it,' he exhaled.

'You give me five hundred, we'll call it even… unless you want something else,' she smiled and pushed her breasts together as she leaned over the counter.

Edward moved in and kissed her on the cheek and cupped the wad of twenties into her hand. 'Maybe some other time, Sue.'

'That's what you always say,' she scoffed.

Edward smiled and placed the pouches and the vial in his coat pocket and walked back through the small shop and exited onto the street. He flinched against the dull pulse of his skull and ripped open one of the pouches and drank.

Mulberry Street left Chinatown behind and became Little Italy within blocks. All the Chinese writing hanging above the storefronts and noodle shops were suddenly replaced by pizzerias and Italian dining and the bright colors of red, white and green. The streets were quieter here.

Edward walked up Mulberry and crossed Broome St. and headed west toward a poorly lit trattoria. The night air had gone bitter and a light mist trailed through the city lights like a coming snow. Most of the businesses had their graffiti-tagged shutters pulled down covering the storefronts and Edward noted this was one of the things about the city he liked most. Graffiti was everywhere. Buildings. Billboards. Subway. Even the trains had tags. It felt completely organic. It could pop up anywhere at any time. A shrewd form of wild foliage finding life through a slab of concrete. But mostly it let him know that things were always changing. It was one of the ways Edward knew he was still relevant.

He stopped in front of the trattoria. Sandwiched between the small restaurant and a dainty flower shop was a glass door. He unlocked the door and went up the worn mosaic stairs. When he reached the top he passed another flight of stairs and walked down a dim stretch of hall and unlocked his door. Edward entered the cool darkness of his apartment. Drawn rays of the night cast through the windows and crossed the bare floor. Ghosted shades of light drafted out like a row of leaning tombstones. He reached into his pocket and palmed the pouches and the small vial and removed his coat and rested it across the chair beside the door.

'Where are you?' he whispered to himself. _At the bottom of that river_… he thought. After he'd received the call confirming Joseph Mackenzie's identity, for which he already knew the answer, he'd returned to the 'C' Rock and stood looking out over the Harlem River. The water was blacker than ever. Light danced across its surface with its ever-moving toll. It reminded him of death. Most water did. He looked to the lights of the city across the river and listened to the low hum of traffic crossing the Henry Hudson Bridge. _The boy had floated_. He played it over and over in his mind. He stayed for over an hour watching the river move.

Edward wandered through the dark and sat down on his worn leather couch. He stuck his hand between the cushions and felt around until he came up with a square leather case. He unzipped the case and removed a syringe with a plastic cap fitted tightly around the tip. There was no ceremony to his actions. Some walked blindly among the living and some walked helplessly among the dead. Edward had become a man of loss. Plain and simple.

He unscrewed the plastic cap from the syringe and plugged it through the rubber seal of the vial and drew up the dark fluid. Ten milligrams. He thumbed the plunger and found a ripe vein trailing along his forearm and drove the sweet nectar home.

Edward let out a deep sigh. As if he was exhausting all the ghosts who haunted and tormented his weary soul. Then he smiled and closed his suffered eyes.

It was three-thirty in the morning when Edward stirred. Still sitting as he had been when he had arrived. His throat felt as if it was barely passable. He rose from the couch and crossed the room and entered the kitchen. He filled a mug with tap water and slowly drank. His insides tightened. The tap flowed into the clogged sink and formed a small dirty pool. Edward watched the water coagulate. He thought of the boy floating in the river at sunset. His withered frame. Skin hugged and taut against his rachitic bones. It reminded him of memories of the victims from some famined war. He turned off the faucet and left the mug. He crossed back into the living space and picked up a pouch of blood and filled a silver flask. Edward put on his coat and opened the door to his apartment and went out into the hall.

The subway was dead. Edward climbed the steps of the 28th Street station and headed back down First Avenue. The misty air had strengthened and came down like a blinding sleet. Edward pulled his coat tightly around him. He turned onto 26th Street and jogged up to the building of the Chief Medical Examiner. He buzzed in and walked through the entryway to the turnstile, showing the young girl sitting behind the half-circle desk his identification.

'Excuse me, Mr. Cullen? You have to sign in,' the girl behind the partition called.

Edward signed the sheet and went through the turnstile and marched down the dimmed hall toward the main autopsy room. He opened his coat and ran his hands through his wet oily hair and sniffed. The shadowy hall comforted him. It seemed a vagueness was always more acceptable and it thrived in this kind of lighting. He stopped in front of the autopsy room and gently opened the door. The room was empty, save the stainless table with wheels resting in the middle. A small form rested under the coating of a thin covering of sheet. Edward crossed the room and delicately peeled away the gray sheet and stood next to the pale boy. Watching. The boy appeared alien.

'Suffering soul,' he said quietly.

Edward placed his fingers over the boy's eyelids and gently opened them. He looked into the boy's opaque eyes. Smoked and clouded. Like some hallowed storm spreading across the horizon, soon to consume everything.

'What did you see?' Edward wanted the boy's empty eyes. He closed the boy's eyelids and moved down the table. He took the boy's hand and held it in his. He turned it over and examined the boy's dirty fingernails. Deep with grit. Then he moved to the foot of the table and held the boy's foot and felt his toes. Both of the boy's hands and his feet were still anserine. _Pruned_. They were black and filthy under the nails as well.

'Where were you? Talk to me, little one. You were somewhere dirty… somewhere dark,' Edward rubbed his face and nose, 'a crawlspace. A sub-cellar maybe.'

He removed the flask from his coat pocket and opened the cap and drank.

'You were taken out of the city, weren't you?' He moved up along the other side of the table and felt the bruising along the boy's neck and extremities. His collarbone and ribcage and the vertebrae along the back of his neck protruded like some skeletal animal starved and discarded along the roadside of some deserted town.

_If you cease before the dawn, will you still come out and dance within the light?_

He took a step back and lowered himself so he was eyelevel with the sallowed shape of the boy. _Whoever did this took their time. They enjoyed it. Definitely a sadist. That narrows things down…_

Someone moved around in the back of the adjoining room. Edward stepped away from the table and gave the boy one last glance. Then he slipped through the door and softly closed it and headed down the hall. A young woman came toward him through the shadows and lighting. She appeared soft, of medium height, and beautiful in the grayness. Edward watched her and then he realized he couldn't look away. She wiped at her eyes and gave him a stoic, hardened gaze. He didn't know why, but he liked it. He liked her.


	7. Washington Sq Park

**Washington Square Park, Manhattan **

Leaves left the trees and drifted through Washington Square Park, dancing along the trafficked walks and angular plots of lawn. Bella crossed under the LaGuardia Place entrance and walked around the east side of the park. She strolled under the elms and maples and passed the Sedum gardens and Buddleja blossoms. When she reached the northeast corner, she rested on a bench where she could view the playground. Children played on the monkey bars and swings, laughing and running. Enjoying the afternoon.

Bella wondered where such pure love went… love for everything… was it systematically carved out of us and dumped onto newspaper like the insides of a pumpkin. Why did we slowly grow to only love what suits ourselves? The image of Joseph Mackenzie lying alone on that shiny table was still reeling in her mind. _How many more? When would it end?_ She feared she already knew the answer.

Eclectic music rang out from the center fountain. The crowds were gathered and passing through the mix of live entertainment. The juggling magician, random guitar serenades, the solo violinist. People watched and busied under the Great Arch that led out to 5th Avenue.

Bella scanned the tourists and students and flocks of mothers pushing their children through the park. She thought of her own mother. Her grandmother before her. And so on. The idea of motherhood made a wisp of intrusion she instinctively brushed off. Even the intention of her becoming a mother seemed so foreign and obtrusive she had no sensible way of relating it.

An attractive young black woman left the NYU Arts and Science building and crossed Washington Square East and entered the park. She had an athletic build with a sexy stride and she wore a small gold hoop in her left nostril. Her skin was soft and almond and the sunlight brightened her golden kinky hair. She turned and walked along the path toward the northeast corner and stopped in front of one of the many wooden benches.

'Long time no see,' she smiled widely.

Bella stood and tightly hugged the girl. 'Bunnie,' she smiled. The two girls warmly embraced like divided flames dancing on blossoms of air, intrinsically fusing as one.

Bunnie laughed, 'Boy, I'd say you really missed me.'

Bella nodded. 'You could say that. It feels like ages.'

Bunnie Wheaton had been Bella's dearest and oldest friend. Growing up on the Upper East Side they attended the same prep academy and were introduced one day during a scuffle over Michael Jackson once again becoming a lighter shade of tan. They eventually agreed it came down to lighting and a bad make-up artist and had been close friends ever since.

Bunnie led Bella toward a walk that twisted and curved to the middle of the park. 'Come on. I have big news.'

Bella leaned into Bunnie as they walked. 'You ever feel like the world is slowly closing in on you?'

'All the time. How's your mom doing?'

Bella half-grinned and gazed a gazeless stare. 'I don't know anymore… it's getting harder and harder to be with her. I don't know if she's even there.'

Bunnie put her arm around her. 'She's there, Bella. And she knows you're there. You're all she has.'

Bella looked at Bunnie. 'Yeah. I know.'

Bunnie shifted gears. 'So… guess what?'

'What?'

'I got us two invitations to the _Gala_ at _The Met_. This could be really big, Bella. A lot of important people are going to be there. It could be great for the both of us.'

Bella nodded. 'When is it?'

'It's in December,' Bunnie paused, 'why? Don't you back out on me? I had to beg and plead for these tickets,' she smirked and cocked her head. 'You're going. If I have to come and drag you, you're going.'

'Okay… okay,' Bella smiled.

They walked through the square and came around the northwest corner, passing under the infamous Hangman's Elm. Bella watched the children rolling across the lawn. Carefree among the strewed piles of dead leaves.

She looked back to Bunnie. 'How have you been?'

'Busy. Caleb left me. No big deal. He was beginning to get that jealous thing. Where have you been? Why didn't you answer your phone? Why do you spend so much time at school? I just got tired of it… and, he left. His loss. If he can't handle a hardworking, beautiful, black woman he doesn't have much of a chance anyway.'

Bella softly laughed. 'That's probably the best thing I've heard in a while.'

'Hell yeah. Bet you a hundred bucks he's calling within the week wanting to come back.'

Bella smiled. 'I attempted to drop Mike, but he didn't get it. He's in his own world.'

'Imagine that. What are you gonna do?'

Bella shrugged. 'I don't know. Move,' she grinned.

'Tell him you contracted herpes. I promise he'll be gone before the week is out.'

Bella abruptly laughed. 'You're twisted.'

'It'll work,' Bunnie nudged her.

Two tall guys, built like they rowed crew, crossed their path and headed for the Arch. Bunnie followed them with her eyes and then her head began to trail.

'Now that's something I might be interested in. I'd take herpes from one of them.'

'Gross,' Bella laughed.

'What? Tell me you wouldn't.'

'I wouldn't,' Bella shook her head.

'Liar,' Bunnie smirked. 'Now I've got a hungry. Feel like some dumplings?'

'I was hoping you'd say something. I'm starving.'

They came out of the park onto Waverly Place and walked up to West 8th Street. Midblock was a Japanese eatery. Righty named Japanese Eatery. One of the best in the city. Bunnie held the glass door and they entered and sat at a small booth in the back corner they had decided to claim. The place was void of decoration and at first glance appeared to be like every other delicatessen in the city. An older Asian man scurried over and smiled and nodded. He was dressed like a Japanese leprechaun. The girls smiled.

'Hello Soko,' they both said.

'Oh… hello my beautiful girls. How are we today? I've been missing you… I already know what to get you. Made special, fresh today, okay?' Soko waved his arms with delight.

They both nodded and grinned. 'Thanks Soko.'

He smiled like a child. 'You are my special girls.'

Bunnie turned her attention back to Bella. 'Listen, Ann and Mica and I are going to the Cake Shop tonight. There's a girl called _Run_ who does a cover of _My Idea of Fun _and _Crimson and Clover_. I hear she's really good… _really good_,' she emphasized.

Bella grinned. 'So is she punk or rock?'

'Punk is dead, baby. True punk anyway. It died with the _Ramones_. But that doesn't mean she isn't as good as people say she is.'

'You're going to try to get her on your label…'

Bunnie raised an eyebrow. '_Foxy Records?_ I don't know. Maybe. She sounds sexy enough. She could be the one. There's nothing cooler than a chick with a guitar strapped to her. Especially if she can play. However, if she is a rebirth of true punk… or better yet the afterbirth, she wouldn't sign with me anyhow. The true punks were anti-label, anti-establishment, anti-everything,' she laughed, 'that's why they were punks. Dig it?'

Bella smiled. 'Maybe she's not a punk.'

'How can she be? Besides, if she were posing, people wouldn't be talking about her the way they are. Word of mouth, baby. That's your true tell. Anyway, we're gonna check it out. See what the girl's got. You should come with.'

'That's the basement club on the Lower East Side, right? The one that's like a hundred and thirty degrees and packed like a meat locker.'

Bunnie smiled. 'Uh huh.'

'_Maybe_.'

Bunnie smirked and nodded. She knew that was meant as a definite _no_. Over the years Bunnie had learned Bella had a hard time saying no. Her alternative of choice had become maybe. _I don't know_… had become maybe and so on.

'How's your investigation coming? You haven't mentioned it for a while. I read about the boy they found in the Harlem River the other day. Sounded like something you'd be involved in. Made me think of you.'

Bella smiled. 'Thanks. The number of people that go missing on a daily basis is mindboggling. They're too random and too hard to track. But these boys. There's something different about them. Joseph Mackenzie,' Bella paused. As if mentioning his name might summon whatever evil lay in wait. She suddenly got a feverish chill.

Bunnie gave her a funny, concerned glare. 'Are you alright?'

Bella forced the shade of a smile. 'Yeah… he's the second little boy to go missing in the last several months. A few years ago the same thing happened. Young boys were randomly being abducted. There was a surge of missing children reports that coincided with these boys and then, nothing. They just stopped. The NYPD were stumped. They didn't want to classify the cases. There were just too many. They had no evidence and no leads. Things started to get desperate.'

'Jesus, Bella. Why don't I remember any of this?'

'Because the majority of missing person cases usually go away after a little while. Most aren't publicized and no one wanted to connect these few boys together. These boys were different. I did find out the FBI has a case file on some of these boys, but not all of them. Over time they couldn't put it all back together. None of the pieces fit. Because there were no bodies, there was no identifiable pattern. There were still missing children reports, but none fell under the same description. Most of the reports filed turned out to be runaways or custodial disputes, where one of the parents ran off with the child,' Bella leaned close, 'I think this has been happening off and on for over fifteen years, Bun. None of the original missing boys were ever found until now. I don't think it's a coincidence.'

'So we're talking a serial kind of thing.'

'I don't know. I think it's much bigger than that.'

'How many are we talking about?'

'Of the original missing boys that fit the pattern… nine that I know of. There may be more, I have a stack of missing children reports as thick as my thigh,' Bella breathed.

'Shitfire… I read there's an ongoing investigation, but they didn't mention any other missing children. What have the police really done? …I mean what do they know?'

Bella softly shook her head. 'I don't know. I haven't talked to anyone involved yet. They're not really too cooperative with my kind,' she half-grinned.

'But they have to work with you, right? I mean… that's their job.'

Bella smirked. 'I don't think so. Doesn't matter. I've been dealing with Social Services and child protection agencies. It's been difficult because they have trouble keeping up with the old paperwork. Anything over ten years ago is stuffed in a box or a filing cabinet somewhere. Did you know a hundred children a year are reported as abduction by a stranger? One hundred. Those are bona fide. These boys fit that description, but they were never classified because there were never any witnesses. Now, suddenly, missing children reports are on the rise again and two more boys go missing within several months of each other. I don't know… I just have a bad feeling, Bun. '

Soko brought over two plates of fresh steaming dumplings and set them down. He smiled and giggled the way an older man admiring youth would. Then he backed away.

'So… tell me what you think?'

'All of the nine missing boys I found are from within the city of Manhattan, about the same age, they all lived with their mothers or grandmothers or extended family. No fathers. They all went missing sometime in the early evening after school. All from different parts of the city. Henry Jennings, the boy who went missing in February, was the first in several years to match the description of those other boys. Now Joseph Mackenzie. I just have a weird feeling, I guess. Like whoever is doing this has been carefully biding their time. Like a hunter, I guess. I don't know… crazy, right?'

'Yeah. But do you feel it in your gut? Is it tickling at your insides?'

Bella hesitated and nodded.

Bunnie leaned back in her chair and contemplated. 'Why the break with all those other missing children? I mean, why did they stop and then start again?'

Bella shook her head. 'I don't know. Maybe something happened. Maybe that's the connection. There must be a link.'

'And now one of those boys has been found, after all that time.'

Bella nodded. 'There's something the medical examiner said that rang true.'

'What's that?'

'She said she didn't think that Joseph was supposed to be found. Her words just seemed so right.'

'Joseph? Sounds like it's getting personal, Bella. You're being careful right? You're not crusading? You know what can happen, right?'

'Yeah. Yes. Always careful,' she looked at Bunnie's face and grinned.

'So what's with the medical examiner?'

Bella nodded. 'I went and saw the boy's body at the OCME.' She was careful not to call Joseph Mackenzie by name.

Bunnie blankly looked at Bella. 'I don't think I could do that… it must have been awful.'

'More like crushing. He was so tiny and helpless. It didn't seem real. So inhuman. I'm afraid of what I might find if I dig too deep,' she shook her head.

Bunnie chewed and swallowed one of her dumplings. 'You should be. God only knows what's waiting in the dark.'


	8. East Side Hospital 2

For some time East Side hospital had been under a constant renovation and expansion for what the city of Manhattan deemed an outcry on the moratorium for better health services. In the end it came down to two things. Politics and money. No surprise there. East Side was and always had been an admired institution. Ranked not only as one of the best hospitals in the state, but in the country. Their bid on exceptionalism was a keystone. It seemed as of late, however, the new government regulations assigned were not just a moral victory for the sake of the public. They were a power grab and they were slowly taking their twisted toll. The world was turning.

It was late in the afternoon when Bella entered the trauma ward to find her mother gone from her room. She spun through the empty hospital room like a child's sudden realization of being lost in the aisles of a department store. Her first thought was her mother had had some kind of complication and passed during the night. She backed through the doorway and attempted to regain her composure. She tried to swallow but couldn't.

'Where's my mother?' she softly chattered. She spoke as if her teeth were wired shut.

'Where's my mother!'

A skinny nurse with a drawn-in face scurried over and attempted to settle her. She used her hands like they were paddles in shallow water, pushing the air away in low bathing swoops.

'Calm down, Miss… calm down. Everything is under control.'

Bella wiped at her eyes. 'Where's my mother? What happened to her? Where is Renée Swan?'

The nurse's animated expressions softened and she gently took Bella by the fold of her arm. 'She's been moved to another facility. Early this morning. You weren't notified?' she shook her narrow head as she spoke.

Bella let out a stutter of relief. Before she thought her tears would strangle her and now they came with an overwhelming pleasantness.

'Oh God… thank you. Thank you. I thought she was gone.'

'That's quite alright. Here, have a seat.' The nurse led her over to a series of scuffed wooden chairs lining the wall outside the rooms. Bella slowly sat and wiped at her face.

'Where did they move my mother?'

'Well, I can't rightly say. That information is privileged between the administrator and her guardian. They felt it was better to place her in a facility more suitable to her needs,' the nurse smiled cheaply.

'Excuse me?' Bella felt the pores on her face and neck and arms flash with the sudden heated charge of electricity. 'Where the hell is my mother?'

The nurse's eyes went wire-thin and she drew her head back with an obvious offense. She patted her drawn-back hair as if it had suddenly been ruffled and stoked the way a bird's feathers shook freely from its back. 'There's no need for that kind of talk.'

Thoughts of laying this stick-girl out across the cold linoleum flashed. Bella swallowed hard. 'Where did they take my mother?'

The nurse eyeballed her with the mount of distaste still settling in the air. 'I don't know. Why don't you ask the person handling her affairs?'

The yellow cab rushed across midtown Manhattan during rush hour. Lights flashed, horns sounded, the ticker of the cab's motor accelerating and then braking. Bella leaned forward away from the cracked vinyl seats, swaying with the maneuvering of the vehicle as it switched lanes and headed up Broadway.

'Can't you go any faster?' Bella pleaded from the back.

'Lady, I'm going as fast as I can!' The cabbie didn't dare glare back through the rearview as he crossed lanes again. He beat the horn in defense and yelled something in Haitian, ending the sentence with 'muthafucka.'

Bella looked at her watch. 'Shit.'

The unmistakable greenery of Central Park South approached as the cab swerved and cut through Columbus Circle, headed for the West Side. Bella slid aside the door with anticipation. She knew she would be on the street with the first red light, but none came. They crossed behind Trump Tower and passed the darkening stretch of West 61st Street.

'Stop! Stop the car!' Bella yelled, handing a twenty through the window.

'Easy lady,' the cabbie shook his head pulling over. He took the twenty and leaned to make change when the back door slammed shut.

Bella crossed Broadway and ran east down West 62nd Street and entered a tall glass building with a Staples in the front. She hurried through the full lobby and slipped into an elevator as the doors were closing. She pushed the button for the 47th floor.

She didn't have a plan. Not enough time had passed for her blood to settle. What she did know was that her mother's lawyer had made a deal with the administrator of the hospital and together they had moved Renée to some undisclosed location. _Power of Attorney _came to mind. If that was the case he could handle her estate in any fashion he saw fit. She was also aware the guy was a scumbag of the highest order. Not just because he was a lawyer, mind you, but because he rose to the top too quickly. He didn't wait to make partner like most of the herd had done, working eighteen hour days and avoiding days off and vacations. Within five years he had his own firm, doling and retrieving large amounts of equity. His client list was whispered to be of a most undesirable and indecent nature. Enraptured in the land of soul sellers.

Bella had always known something wasn't right. It was still a mystery why her mother had gotten involved with the man. With her intelligence and legal background she must have known. Bella had pleaded with her mother to get away from him. Now it was too late.

She got off the elevator and entered the firm of Louis M. Lewis. The front wall was set in by a great limestone monolith and hung neatly over the sprawling reception desk and fashioned in large, shiny gold lettering was the man's name. Bella slipped right through the front and charged headstrong toward the back of the office. The receptionist barely caught a glimpse of her as she passed. The girl leapt from her seat and chased after her.

'Miss… Miss! You can't go back there! Stop right there! Damn it!' The receptionist spun and headed back to the front and picked up her phone.

Bella stopped at the immense office of Louis M. Lewis and opened his door and stepped inside. Two men sat on cherry leather couches smoking cigars and sipping an amber liquid from square crystal tumblers, most likely an expensive scotch. One man much older than the other. They paused and greeted her with questionable silence. The younger man raised his thick eyebrows and set down his drink.

'Can I help you?' he said inquisitively.

Bella exhaled. 'Where did you place my mother?'

Lewis looked to the older man and then back to Bella. 'You must be Miss Swan. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Louis M. Lewis.'

Bella shook her head. 'I know who you are. I want to know what you did with my mother.'

Lewis smiled with indifference. 'Would you like something to drink?'

Bella stepped closer. 'Where the hell is my mother?'

'Well, as you may or may not know, the hospital could only provide so much as far as the needs go in adequately caring for your mother. Mr. Randall, the administrator, and myself decided she would be better off in a facility more apt in handling patients like your mother. Are you following?' he slightly smirked.

'You don't have the right.'

'Oh… on the contrary, I certainly do. And with the advisement of Mr. Randall it was so done.'

'Where is she?'

'I understand your concern, Miss Swan, but you have nothing to worry about. She is being well taken care of in a hospice in New Jersey. Right across the river. It may be a little more expensive, but she is having all of her needs met.' He picked his drink back up and took a lengthy sip.

Bella's gaze narrowed and stung. 'I know what you're doing.'

Lewis gave her a look to cower a saint. 'If you mean handling your mother's estate, well then, you are correct. That is exactly what your mother hired me to do. I am very good at what I do, Miss Swan. Now… if there isn't anything else, I'm in the middle of a meeting.'

Two security guards stepped inside the office and waited like a pair of trained pitbulls, hunched and set for the order to kill. Lewis looked at the men and winked.

'I don't think this one will be any trouble gentlemen. You won't be any trouble… will you, Miss Swan?'

Bella felt her heart pounding in her chest. Consuming. She was compromised. She had been challenged in the heart of the dragon's lair and she had come unarmed and unprepared. She slowly looked away and shook her head.

'Very well then,' he grinned savagely.

Bella turned in a daze. _You're a fool_, she thought, _a damn fool_. She headed for the door, still spinning from the adrenaline rush and the sting of defeat.

'Oh… Miss Swan? Don't you want the name of the hospice?'

Bella slightly turned her head. Her eyes were cold and glazed.

'The Chelsea Center. Good day, now.'

The two guards let her pass between them and then closed in behind, following her with precision, their eyes on her every move. She walked through the front of the office and stepped to the elevator without looking back.

When she reached the street she realized she had missed another one of Professor Rice's class. _Shit! Screw it…_ The only thing on her mind was Louis M. Lewis. He wouldn't get away with it. She wouldn't let him. She instinctively played with the pieces of the puzzle. The Chelsea Center was a very prestigious hospice. More like an expensive facility for the wealthily disabled. She knew Lewis was getting a kickback. _Probably a million, maybe more_. She also knew something had passed between himself and the administrator of the hospital. They were both getting a piece from that as well. That would be a little trickier. _Fuckers_. The only goal she had now was uncovering Lewis' past.

_What about Joseph? _

He would have to wait. I don't have anything to really follow up yet anyway. Just a loose behavioral pattern.

_What about the next little boy?_

Maybe there won't even be another little boy.

_But there will be… _

Damn it, I know it.

_You can stop him… _

Him?

Her mind fired thoughts in rapid succession, pinging off each other like a game of pong. She headed north toward the subway station at Lincoln Center. The streets grayed and the random lighting of businesses and office windows high above fetched the allure of some ornamental sentiment. Like Christmas lights blinking and waning in succession to no end. People were heading home and the walks were beginning to overcrowd. She fished out her cell and found Jacob in her contact list and dialed his number. Straight to voicemail.

'Hey… it's Bella. I need your help. Let me know when we can meet. I have another big favor to ask. Bye.'

It was dark by the time Bella came out of the subway at 116th Street. She felt ill. She missed her mother. Even if their relationship had withered to the point where she just held her hand and spoke to her. She thought about what she had said to Bunnie. Now she wished she had never said it. The effort wasn't hard, the response was. She missed her.

The small grocery at 121st Street was well lit by seven and she entered and went through to the back of the store. She scanned the row of coolers and opened one of the glass doors and picked out a six pack of beer. She went down the limited cosmetics aisle and grabbed a pair of styling shears molded in plastic packaging and a box of permanent black hair dye. When she reached the front of the store she set the items on the counter and picked up two boxes of Mac and Cheese and a pair of cheap dark sunglasses. The clerk smiled and bagged the goods and nodded graciously as he rang her up. She had been buying small items from the guy for over two years and they had never exchanged words. Not once.

'Thanks,' she nodded.

_By tomorrow morning it wouldn't matter anyway. He won't be able to recognize me_, she thought, pleased with herself. _No one will._


	9. Greenville, Pa 50 years earlier

_Jimmy Dryler crossed the narrow creekbed that branched away from the dark waters of the Shenango River. In the summertime the tides were low and only a thin stream of brackish water twisted and ravined its way over the polished toothed stone of the bed. Places of the sort always held a primitive quality, as if they had always been, and if any man had never come along to witness their existence they would always be, unchanged and untouched till the end of days. _

_He came up through the low ferns and undergrowth and pushed deeper into the expanse of wood. Like many boys his age there came a time of questionable solitude. An independence that bloomed and drove them to seek a further exploration of the outside world and what mysteries it held. But most importantly, to take a personal claim of some hallowed piece of ground, special only to them and them alone. A temptation deep-rooted within that solely served as the nascent in the foundational workings of the making of a man._

_By the time he broke through into the low-lying hills the sun was at its highest point, slowly arcing to the west. Dandelion blooms and wheat grass. Dry amorous smells of a summerland, breathing with fecundity. He swam through the high grass and pushed on leaving the shadow of his broken trail. As if he had mysteriously weaved it into the earth. This may be what heaven is like, he thought._

_When he reached the bluff he stopped to gather what loose sticks and foliage he could find and collected them into a neat pile in the deep shadows of colorful stone. He carefully removed his shoelace and bound his bounty into a clever thatch, which he tied ever-so-tightly and swung over his back like some vaudevillian vagabond. Up the slope he went. A pawing digitigrade, clawing at the jagged wings of escarpment and moving gingerly from stone to stone with the agility and grace only a young boy obtained. He paused halfway and looked to the sun, a clever smile, as if the light watching over him humbly approved and he was grateful. The darkened span of a hawk's plumes soared and circled._

_When he reached the ledge he heaved the bundle of wood to its floor and pulled himself over its ridge and lay there. He could only imagine that he may be the last true cowboy as he looked upon the quiet stretch of valley below. Pure gold. A virgin plain sewn and only parted by his graying trail. _

_He thought of his heroes. Brave in his heart. Paladin. The Lone Ranger. _

'_Here's where I'll make my last stand,' he spoke softly. 'Because that's what cowboys do.'_


	10. Police Plaza

Pink shades of sky darkened and rolled blood red with the retiring sun. Like swooning eyes rolling back to reveal the mapping of their spider-blooded roots. Autumn always bequeathed a peaceful, solemn state. With the changing colors and withering leaves it extended its hand so pleasantly at the welcoming of winter's call. An agent so soft-spoken, freely lending itself to the request of the dead and dying. Enticing those newly chosen for the eternal sleep to come.

Edward walked down St. James Place and stopped in front of Chatham Square. Children played on the jungle gym, climbing through wooden slats and into the small towers which led to a connecting bridge and a spiral slide. Down they'd go, laughing and adventurous and then back up again. Over and over.

He walked up to Madison Street and turned and crossed Park Row and entered the graying New York Police Headquarters building. He rode the elevator to the fifth floor and bowed his head as he entered the Special Investigation Division. He passed through the long hall of dim offices and walked to the back and stopped next to a woman sitting at a small desk aside a metallic office door. She was middle-aged and attractive in a youthful way and she smiled at Edward when he looked at her.

'Go on in detective… he's been waiting for you.'

Edward curled his lips and entered the office and closed the door behind him. He lumbered across the carpet and stopped next to the desk. Captain Burns sat with his hands folded on his desk and watched Edward without saying a word.

'Captain… how are things?'

Burns agitatedly nodded. 'Have a seat, Edward.'

'I'd rather stand,' he grinned pulling a cigarette from his coat and lighting it.

'Take the God damn seat!' Burns' voice changed octaves to a gruff throated yelp.

Edward smiled and sat down in front of the Captain's desk. He let a small trail of smoke escape from his lips.

'I'm going to cut to the quick of it… that little stunt you pulled the other day in the Bronx has the Chief Inspector up my ass. We got complaints from two precincts and the Harbor Patrol. They want to pull you out of Special Investigation and put you on a psychiatric discharge.'

Edward nodded.

'You got to cut the shit, man. People are starting to question your God damn sanity!' he barked leaning back in his chair. He rolled his hands back across his graying hair. 'Do you even care anymore? For Christ sake… why don't you just hand in your papers?'

'What do you want from me?'

'An answer.'

'All due respect… fuck them, Sir.'

'Fuck them… good,' the Captain soured.

Edward nodded and rocked forward as if to expose something intimate.

'I had to see the boy right then, Cap. Before anyone else tampered with him. I had to see what happened to him… what that sonofabitch did to him. To be with him, understand?' he blew a thin trail of smoke into the air.

Capt. Burns paused and crudely rubbed at his cob of a nose. 'Bill Cunnings has recommended they send you to _the_ _farm_. Counseling, they call it. Once a week. It's your best shot. It's been three years, son. You're not getting any younger and you're carrying that ghost around with you and everybody God damn well knows it.'

Edward shook his head and looked down at the patches of red carpeting lining the surrounding floor. His stomach constricted. He felt like his insides were coming loose. He wanted to vomit.

'You don't have a choice. It's either that or a permanent suspension. Basically you're up shit's creek.' Capt. Burns folded his hands and placed them back on his desk. 'Personally, I think it'll do you some good.'

Edward smiled as if he was going to burst into laughter. 'Billy-boy Cunnings… what a world,' he grinned, shaking his head through his nausea. He looked back at Capt. Burns. Burn's read him completely.

Sergeant Bill Cunnings had risen fast when he transferred to SID. He was slick and had made some moves, all aimed for his benefit. It wasn't from humping it or blistering hours of investigation. He was a desk jockey who frequently took to busting the real cops in the division balls. All he did was play with the pieces and then step up for the credit. He didn't think highly of the special investigator and he certainly didn't like Edward. His foremost saving grace was that he was close to the Commissioner's youngest daughter. Edward wondered how far he had his hand up the Commissioner's daughter's ass. _What an asshole_.

'A shrink?' Edward furrowed his brow.

Capt. Burns roughly nodded.

'What about the little boy they pulled from the river?'

'What about him?' Burns raised his thick eyebrows. 'Clemente and his team are questioning the boy's school and neighborhood. They're making the rounds… watching the bathrooms at Penn Station and Grand Central... Port Authority, the Garden. The regular scumbag hangouts. Clemente has men all over the city digging for information from pedophiles and sexual predators with priors. Hell, it's not even a missing person's case anymore. They found the boy. It's a homicide investigation now. Somebody else will handle it,' he grunted.

Edward leaned forward and stamped out his cigarette. 'You think someone else is going to even give a shit knowing this is probably going to lead to another dead end? Why don't you just hand the case over to Cunnings?' Edward rose from the chair. 'Did you see the boy, Cap? …He was starved and stuck in a fucking hole somewhere and then this sadistic fuck ripped his tongue from his throat. He was just a boy!'

'I read the report.'

Edward mockingly applauded. 'Well that's just fantastic… fucking fantastic.'

Capt. Burns burst from his seat and came around the desk.

'Look you crazy sonofabitch, do you think you're the only one who's seen horrible things? They happen every day… all the time. They happen to good people and children and elderly ladies getting fucking raped for a God damned cold-cut sandwich because the sick bastard felt like a little pussy with his ham!'

The woman behind the outside desk slowly turned her head toward the office and furrowed, as if she wasn't sure what to make of what she overheard. Then she cautiously looked away.

Edward moved toward the door and pointed back at the Captain. 'I've been to the boy's building and stood outside his window. I've walked down his street. It's lit up like a soul in waiting. This was carefully executed dammit. It's happened before and it's going to happen again. He can't help himself. He's out there right now. Waiting.'

'You can't save them all, son.'

'You think I don't know that.'

Capt. Burns nodded sympathetically. 'Well then, I suggest you reconsider and do what you do best.'


	11. Curry Lounge

Smoke curled in pale tendrils, disposing itself into a fine white mist throughout the small bar. The place was dank and dim and smelled of stale tobacco and sweet lingering ferment. An acceptable dive, unclean and fit for those most suited with occupational hazards and those who preferred to spend their days in the windowless confines of someplace dark.

Jacob Black sat at the bar drinking absinthe and pondering whether the girl working behind the bar had had her breasts done. She was cute and upbeat and she swung her hips as she moved. He watched her reflection from where he sat and examined the firmness of her breasts flouncing underneath her tight knit shirt. They were nice, no doubt, and he enjoyed toying with the idea of her youthful dexterity and twisted perversions.

He jostled a cigarette from the pack and lit it and tossed the lighter and crumpled pack onto the countertop. The door to the outside world swung open and held there. Light from the street blinded and exposed the few occupants like subterranean creatures cowering in the smoky corners of some cavernous dwelling.

A young woman with a 1920's bobbed hairstyle, short rounded bangs and ear-length straight black hair, stepped inside the bar and pulled the door closed behind her. She was small in stature and paled except for the lines of her thin blackened lips and the dark hollows penciled around her eyes and the insides of her nostrils. She wore an opened black hooded sweatshirt with a sleeveless vest underneath and a pair of black leather pants. The other patrons watched her with an air of cynical repulsion.

She chose her steps carefully as she moved across the smoky bar and sidled up and sat down on the empty stool resting next to Jacob. He looked at her sideways and filtered back the rest of his drink. The dark girl leaned in and took his cigarettes and lighter from the counter and slid one out of the pack and placed it to her black lips and lit it.

'Help yourself,' Jacob eyed the girl.

'I will,' the dark girl inhaled and began to cough.

'Those things will kill you,' Jacob grinned.

'No shit,' the girl looked away.

Jacob leaned back and looked the girl over. There was a sense of comic edginess to the whole situation. He was also a little taken by her brazenness.

'Do I… did I buy a dime from you?' Jacob grinned.

'I don't think so,' the girl breathed, smoke escaping from her dark lips.

'Do you have any smoke?'

'No.'

'X?'

The girl shook her head and exhaled residual smoke.

Jacob waved his glass. 'Hey, Jess… two more,' he nodded. He laid the money on the counter and looked back at the girl. 'So… aren't you a little dark for this kind of place? What I mean is, shouldn't you be at a rave. Maybe a ritual killing.'

'Cute. Are you always this charming or only when the odds are against you?'

Jacob laughed. 'Does it matter?'

The girl shook her head. 'Apparently not.'

'What's your name?'

'What do you want it to be, Jake?' she blew a strong waft of smoke in his face.

Jacob furrowed his brow and cocked his head. 'Um… should I… how do you?' he sputtered through the cloud dissolving around his head.

The dark girl smiled as the girl behind the bar set the drinks in front of them and took the money and walked back to the other end. The dark girl picked up her drink and sipped.

Jacob never took his eyes off of her. Finally he gushed. 'Jesus Christ on a popsicle stick… Bells? Bella?' he said genuinely amazed, 'I can't believe my sore eyes. What the hell did you do? You said you needed help, but I had no idea.'

She remembered her first impression as she examined herself in the reflection of her bathroom mirror. Basin and counter covered with wet black hair. Sexy. Futuristically sexy. It was all her.

'Pretty hot… huh?' Bella winked.

'Jesus, you look like a fucking psychopath!'

Bella gave a sultry smile. 'Not exactly what I had in mind, but it'll work.'

Jacob quickly finished his drink and exhaled. 'You're still blowing my mind here,' he set down his glass and turned to face her. 'What the hell is going on?'

'It's complicated.'

'Does this have anything to do with the boy? What's his name? Joey…'

'Joseph Mackenzie. No. This is personal. I want to gut someone. Someone untouchable. I'm going to need to enlist the help of your friend,' she stamped her cigarette out in the butt-filled ashtray.

'That's a little broad, Bells,' he smirked.

'Look, the less you know… you know how that goes,' she gave him a serious glare.

'Bullshit. Don't fuck with me, Bells… if you want my help you can't keep me in the dark… you can't just keep me in the dark! Keep me in the dark,' he mumbled and raised his glass toward Jessica at the other end of the bar. 'How untouchable?'

Bella paused. The gears grinded away inside her mind. Playing on the gravity of the circumstances. She breathed out and then she conceded. 'Lewis M. Louis.'

Jacob squinted and a devilish quality crossed his sobering face. He floundered a cigarette from the pack and lit it. 'That is… something.'

Bella nodded. 'So…'

'So are we talking about my young friend Rube?'

Bella nodded.

'It's going to cost you. The kid ain't cheap. But he can dig it up… whatever it is. I promise you that.'

'How much?'

Jessica came down with another tequila sunrise and set it down in front of Jacob. He handed her a bill and watched her walk back to the other end. 'At least five, maybe more. Depends on what kind of mood he's in. His youth and expertise affords him to be temperamental.'

'Okay. I'll get the money.'

Jacob put his hand on Bella's arm like a brake. 'You sure you want to do this? This isn't a game, Bella. If that scumbag catches on to what you're up to, he'll come after you with everything he's got.'

'I suspect he's stealing from my mother,' her fawn eyes darkened, 'I'm sure he is. This is my family, Jacob.'

Jacob reached into his back pocket and adjusted his posture and placed a heavy object into her palm, concealing it with her black-painted fingers. 'Take this, just in case. I'd recommend getting a gun.'

Bella opened her hand and looked down at a nickel-plated pair of brass knuckles. She threaded her fingers through the widened holes and made a fist.

'I like it.'

'Use them in good health… as they say,' Jacob grinned. His face turned dark and he looked at Bella with deep concern. 'Be careful, Bells. I'll be keeping a close watch on everything. I don't trust that cocksucker.'

'Thanks Jake.'

Roosevelt Island was a community all its own. Set between Manhattan and Queens it was bordered by the East river and inhabited around 9000 people as of the last census. Most of them were retired or families or students. A few minor celebrities. The number of streets were limited to three main roads, giving it an isolated setting. A quality a commune or large village might have. At night the lights of Manhattan stretched like the stargazed beacons of some far-off distant land.

Bella got off the subway on Main Street of the island and headed north toward the Roosevelt Island Public Library. She passed the Trellis and Chapel of the Good Shepard and crossed through the public square. When she came out the other side she stopped and entered the iron gates of the small Island Storage facility and went to the very back. Lot 303.

Five years ago her father had passed from a fatal progression of heart disease. He was an older man and when she was born he had just celebrated his forty-first birthday, she his only child. This dignified him in some strange way and Bella felt she must have acquired her strong intelligence from his elderly state. He was a doting father. The kind of father who embraced and distributed the wisdom and patience of a grandfather. Bella was treated more like a small person than a child. That was how she was raised. Maybe that was why she had loved him so much. It broke her heart when he passed.

She unlocked the padlock and slid the bolt free from the cement wall holding the large bay door shut. Her father had left her something. Something special. Aside from the trust she used for her schooling, she had never had the desire to receive it.

_There's a time and a place for everything_, she thought.

Roughly, the bay door crunched as it slid above her head and she stepped inside the dark building and flicked the switch on the wall. Nothing. She played with the switch a couple of times and left it off. _Doesn't matter._ There was enough light cast across the floor from the outside to guide her to the back of the building. She stepped up to the clouded shape and slowly drew its draped covering forward and pulled it completely off. Her breathing suddenly quickened. It was more beautiful than she remembered. Mint.

The steel-black 68' Camaro Rally Sport roared across the Queensborough Bridge and headed toward midtown Manhattan. Bella couldn't fade the twisted grin pulling at her black lips. Nothing could have been more fitting. She felt as dark as she looked. Like some dark rider drawn from the depths to fulfill the sentencing of the damned. The only thing that pulled her from her ashen cloud was the matter she now had to contend with and she had to be completely focused. In some bizarre way her father was helping her to protect her mother. This she knew in her heart.

She drove around the south end of Central Park and turned onto Broadway and followed it north to West 61st Street. When she came to West 62nd, she slowed the Camaro and turned between the darkened stretch of buildings and pulled over from the parking garage for the large Staples building. Louis M. Lewis' building. She knew he drove a silver Mercedes S550 sedan. She had been there when he picked her mother up for lunch one day in March to discuss her estate. It was new. Probably to give himself a more polished and professional appearance, not allowing his ego to give too much away. _Clever_. She envisioned him in a red Ferrari. There was a prestige that signified his type of personality with a Ferrari. Arrogant and powerful. It was only fitting. And she was sure he owned one, but today he'd be pulling out of that garage in his Mercedes. It was only a matter of time.

It occurred to her this was her first time tracking someone to methodically stalk and monitor without being noticed. Surveillance was protocol. She only hoped she could pull it off. He certainly wouldn't recognize her. She turned her cell to vibrate and adjusted her black sunglasses against the glare coming through windshield. She slid back into the leather folds of her seat. Now she would wait.


	12. Times Square

Jay Harvey slowly cruised down Seventh Ave. through the heart of Times Square. The ragged Buick owned by his grandmother desperately chugged along under the fantasia of lights. There was a harmony between the lights and the sounds of the street. The honking horns. The screams. The laughter.

He took a hit off his inhaler and pushed the frame of his glasses up the scarred bridge of his nose and stared bitterly at the awed tourists wandering between the rainbows of electric color. He felt sorry for them. Mocking them with delightful expressions, the Midwestern tourists fashioned in their colorful, frumpy shirts.

_Their lives must be so mundane, _he thought. Jay Harvey relaxed his face and smirked. It made him feel sharp. Like a wolf among the sheep. It felt good to be back in the city. He was a long way from his grandmother's basement in Mount Vernon.

'Silly fools,' he breathed.

Times Square had become a kind of Disneyland. Live entertainment. Theaters. Shops. The smells of grilling and fried foods haunted the sidewalks. There was even a Disney store right in the heart. Between Planet Hollywood and McDonalds.

Harvey turned onto 42nd Street and headed for the Port Authority Bus Terminal. He considered how slim his chances were of finding what he was looking for, but on the other hand he was feeling lucky tonight. He'd worn his favorite muscle-shirt that showed off his arms. Something he was extremely proud of. Not just because they were defined, but because of the discipline it took to earn them. Jay Harvey felt his whole existence was rooted in discipline. It was one of the things that separated him from the sheep.

He slowed the Buick and carefully watched the sidewalks. He didn't want to rush it. Yet his hunger consumed him. His patience couldn't contend with his desire much longer.

Chevy's Tex-Mex Grill passed by and then he crossed 8th Ave. and made a U-turn and pulled over in front of the bus terminal. A young girl with urban shagged hair stood leaning against one of the blue grated supports. She was thin and wiry and at first he mistook her posture for a young boy's. She wasn't exactly what he was looking for. He sat watching her and took into account how young she looked. She couldn't have been more than sixteen. Maybe younger. He liked that she looked like a boy. He felt a nervous sweat.

Thirteen years earlier Jay Harvey had been arrested for following a young boy in New Rochelle. When the police psychologist asked him, he told her it couldn't have felt more right. He had never considered himself a homosexual. He had never really considered himself anything. The few sexual experiences he had had left him feeling awkward and embarrassed. Jenny Kirkpatrick had recoiled in her feigned attempt at modesty and laughed in his face when he prematurely ejaculated in his pants. She laughed until he began to cry. He remembered thinking how he stunk of shame. She'd called him pathetic. It was a nightmare.

But when he saw that boy, absent of malice, alone, something inside him changed. At that particular moment in time he broke free from his earthly binds. He felt a strength he had never felt before. It was what he had always been searching for. He'd gotten so excited he went dizzy and a man across the block saw him and beat the shit out of him. It would be a defining moment in the life of Jay Harvey. He still got a sudden chill when he thought about it.

The girl stood watching him and finally pushed herself off the grating and approached the car and knocked on the muck-stained window. Harvey leaned over and fluidly rolled down the window.

'Looking for something?' she cocked her head.

Harvey was suddenly taken by how different the girl appeared up close. Her features were chiseled and smooth as marble. In fact, she was so pretty her face could have been carved out of the very stone. Her deep eyes fluttered. They shined and pooled like the blend of colors skimmed atop a puddle of dirty oil. They held his gaze and darkened.

'Well?'

Harvey was speechless. He nodded. 'Get in.'

The girl opened the door and slid in. She sat with her legs open and Harvey gazed down at the luring pose of her lean, bare thighs. He pulled away from the bus terminal and slid his hand along the pale flesh lining the top of her thigh. His body twitched when he touched her.

'You've been out there a while. You're chilled to the bone.'

The girl smiled. 'Where are we going?' Her smile was flat and under the shadows of colorful light she had begun to lose her femininity.

Harvey couldn't keep himself from looking over. The more he watched her, the more masculine she appeared. He cracked his window to relieve the sweat running across his brow. He turned onto 8th Ave. and headed north toward Central Park South.

'Somewhere special,' he said distinctly and smiled oddly.

'Okay.' The girl took hold of his clammy hand and placed it back inside the fleshy pocket created by her thighs. Jay Harvey suddenly got that dizzy feeling.


	13. Dreaming

Sunlight filtered down through the trees. Illuminating the patches of fresh grass like a fan of colored plumage, ruffled loosely and scattered and giving the shadows an enchanting quality. Bella rolled from side to side in the downy grass, giggling playfully under the span of a great oak. She watched her mother set up the plates and drinks and blanket, methodically, which had always been her way. It was something that had stayed secure in Bella's mind. A small development she secretly loved about her mother.

Bella rolled from under the tree and moved through the grass. Stalking. Pivoted on all fours like some daring wildcat. When she came to where the grass was unkempt, she froze and recoiled in curious delight. A kit the size of a Twinkie lay silent among the weeds. Its little paws were outstretched, ears back, a pair of fearful, dark eyes watching her. It didn't move. At first she feared it was dead, save the minute pulse against its fawn fur as it quickly took breaths. Bella slinked back and stood and ran to her mother.

'Mama… Mama, come quick! There's a baby bunny here… hurry!'

Bella's mother rose from the blanket and came over to the edge of weeds and knelt beside her daughter. She watched the kit and assessed what she immediately knew to be true.

'I think it may be sick, sweetie.'

Bella looked to her mother with the hopeful eyes that only children have. Eyes that know their moms or dads are the only ones capable of saving the world.

'We have to help him, mama… please,' she pleaded. 'He's a baby.'

Renée peacefully looked into her daughter's soft brown eyes and smiled. It struck her how wise and honest a child could be. She nodded and went back under the aged oak and removed a small container from their basket and filled it with loose grass and weed. She crossed back to where Bella sat and kneeled. Gently, she slid her hand under the kit's backside and scooped it into her palm and placed the delicate creature into the container.

'I know we can save him, mama. I'll call him Mr. Friendly.'

'Mr. Friendly?'

Bella nodded. 'Because he smiled when you picked him up.'

Renée smiled. 'I think that's a wonderful name.'

Several days passed. They fed the kit milk and kept it warm. Bella never left Mr. Friendly's side. But on the fifth day the kit was still and lay there stretched on its side, exposing the stripe of white down lining its underside. Bella cried in her mother's embrace. They sat together on the small antique sofa and she curled into her mother and softy wept.

When she lifted her head she was back in the hospital. Her mother laid still and quiet like Mr. Friendly had. Bella held her mother's hand and gently kissed her bony knuckles. Her mother rolled her pale eyes and opened her gray-chapped mouth. Her tongue was a piece of gnawed muscle. A horrible hissing sound escaped. Blood ran from the sides of her mouth and from her nostrils, staining the pillow and sheets covering her.

'Mom! Mom! Help! Somebody help me!'

Bella fell against the wall and covered her face and eyes. 'Please…'

She blindly turned into the wall and cowered, drawing her arms over her head. She attempted to steady herself. Everything was spinning out of control. She slid to the floor and heard a whisper, soft as a child's.

Suddenly, she spun and opened her eyes to see Joseph Mackenzie lying on the cold steel table inside the autopsy room. The boy was white as paper. She shivered and stepped back, away from the table. The room smelled of salt and waste and soured soil. Like the river. She waded through the murk of the ankle-deep water slowly filling the room. Bella turned to leave but there was no door. When she turned to face the boy again, his head was leaning toward her. He raised his frail arm to reach for her and slowly opened his desperate eyes.

'…help, it's coming… it's coming back… please,' he whispered helplessly.

Bella slid from the edge of her bed and hit the cold, wood flooring of her apartment. She was covered in sweat and she sat there shivering in the darkened shadows. Moments can sometimes be like dark whispers. Secretly slithering into one's thoughts and burrowing in for the Devil's profit. She drew her knees close to her chest and hugged her bare legs and began to softly rock back and forth. The clock read 3:33.

**Earlier… **

The city had gone dark when Lewis pulled out of the parking garage. He cruised in his silver Mercedes and drove to the end of 61st Street and turned onto Broadway. Bella carefully followed behind as he headed south and crossed midtown and turned onto Park Ave. They traveled south until Lewis turned around on Park Ave. and pulled in front of the Waldorf Astoria and let the valet take his car. Bella slowed the Camaro and pulled over in front of the Colgate Palmolive building across the street from the grand hotel.

Two hours passed before Lewis finally came out. She had almost missed him. As far as she could tell there was nothing unusual about the situation. He most likely went to the Emperor's Room for drinks. An older gentleman came out and stood talking with Lewis. They were firmly engaged and familiar.

Bella adjusted the pair of sport-binoculars and focused on the older gentleman. She didn't recognize him but he dressed well and carried himself with a commanding throttle, posturing himself dominantly against Lewis' arrogance. She could see Lewis was getting agitated. She lay back across the front seats and zoomed her digital camera to its max and snapped three pictures of the two men.

Lewis received his car from the valet and Bella followed him back uptown along Park Avenue. He turned onto 66th Street and drove until he reached 5th Ave and parked in front of a large brownstone on the east side of Central Park. She stopped before he could see her and then she watched him enter the building and disappear. Bella took photos of the brownstone and waited. He never came back out.

When she arrived at her apartment building in Harlem it was late. She had taken the Camaro back to the storage garage and locked it up. She didn't trust leaving it on the street. Vintage sports cars had a way of disappearing in the city.

She entered her building and moved clumsily up the stairs. The smell of tobacco lingered in the air. As she turned onto the next flight of stairs Mike was coming down. He was on his cell as usual and hers had begun to vibrate in her pocket, tickling her thigh. He gave her a quick glance and snickered and kept on going. Bella slowly turned her head and suddenly realized he hadn't recognized her.

_Good. A shadow of my true self, _the residue of Mike's words hung on the air. A sudden sense of relief washed over her. She let him go and continued up the stairs. When she reached her door the door across the hall quietly opened and stood a quarter cocked. A figure hovered in the darkness watching Bella through the small crack of wan light.

'Hello Mrs. Ellison. How are you tonight?'

The figure breathed shallowly. 'You changed your hair.'

'Yes.'

'I didn't recognize you. Are you in some sort of trouble?'

'No. I just… needed a change.'

'I heard voices in the hall. I was worried about you… I haven't seen you for some time.'

Bella nodded. 'I've been working… that's all.'

'Of course. You're young. Ambitious. The whole world seems to revolve around you,' the figure paused and waited and continued to watch her through the darkness. 'How's your mother?'

'I… I don't know,' Bella shook her head. 'I haven't seen her for a few days.'

'My son never visits anymore. Busy. Always busy. I've become some kind of terminal burden.'

'Don't say that.'

'I don't have to.'

Bella nodded.

'You appear tired, dear… I'll let you go in. I'm here if you need me. Good evening.' The door quietly creaked as it closed shut.

'Good night.'

Bella unlocked her door and entered her apartment and undressed and went to bed. Her stomach pinched and churned a low hollow growl. She was starving but she didn't care. The pictures she had taken needed to be emailed to Jacob.

_They can wait until morning_. Her mind toiled. Too many unanswered questions. She was exhausted. She let out a deep sigh and felt herself disembody as she sank into darkness. Joseph Mackenzie's memorial was in the morning.


	14. Knickerbocker Village

Jacob Black sat at the small table in the nook of his apartment drinking a beer half-blended with tomato juice. He swallowed until his eyes watered and set the empty bottle on the table and let out a slow hiss of carbonated air.

'Breakfast of fuck-ups,' he muttered. Then he snorted as if to retort his own words.

The apartment was small and cluttered and resembled an overloaded documents room save some basic furniture. There was a sleeper sofa. A couple of side tables stacked with boxes. A few standing lamps. The table and chairs. An ancient clock-radio. In the corner there was a box piano and an overflowing set of bookcases. Boxes of files were mounted on everything.

Jacob glanced over to the opened sleeper sofa and breathed disappointment. Jessica, the attractive bartender from the Curry lounge, lay half-naked and entangled in the mass of sheets across his makeshift bed. She snored awfully. He scratched his head and looked back to the clutter across his table. Chinese takeout boxes lay scavenged and spread among the empty beer bottles and fugitives of loose rice resting along the edge of the table. Sadly, these two images fit together.

For over five years now Jacob had been wrestling with his demons. Not figuratively mind you, but literally. His Quileute heritage had seized him like a wild animal. It began with the visions. Horrible dreams he couldn't escape. They cluttered his mind like a thousand voices crying for help all at once. Then he began to sense the evil in others. It was everywhere he went. The store clerk that enjoyed torturing animals. The vice principal that used his authority to lure female students into his office so he could fantasize about them under his desk. It was all too much. His brain felt like it was on fire, a constant mind-numbing pain. He was in agony.

One night Jacob couldn't take it anymore. He'd known Mrs. Winters his entire life. She was a widow that organized the church bingo at the rec center. She had always been a charitable and friendly older woman. One who spent her afternoons watching kids play at the park. And Jake knew why. Her lust was coveting the children she starved to death in her basement. Sometimes more than one at a time.

When Jacob showed up at the old woman's house she knew why he was there. She had greeted him with a sinister grin. He could have sworn her eyes went black.

'I always knew you would come for me, son,' she giggled like a child.

Jacob felt queasy. 'Don't call me son.'

Mrs. Winters back towards the cellar door in her kitchen. She slowly nodded and removed her eyeglasses and set them on the countertop. She stood there wringing her hands and then she looked at Jacob with a sense of pride.

'It was the only way I could teach God,' she hissed.

There wasn't much of a struggle. Mrs. Winters had thrown herself down her cellar steps and broken her back. She lay there moaning and crippled in pain. Jacob left her there. He knew she would starve to death like so many of her victims. He fled the Black Hills that very night.

Jacob lit a cigarette and exhaled and stared at the photos on his laptop. He rested his head against his palm and scrolled back through the series of pictures.

The owner of the brownstone on 5th Ave. had taken no time. He simply entered the address into the city records website and retrieved the deed. The building did not belong to Lewis. He did a little more digging and was surprised by the results. _Easy Peasy_. Now if he could identify the older gentleman in the photo standing outside the entrance of the Waldorf. He stared intently at the last picture. The close-up of Lewis M. Louis and the older gentleman was blurred. Jacob squinted and shook his head.

'I know you…' he spoke, taking another sip from his milky tomato-beer.

He clicked back a frame and swiveled his head. Jacob blinked hard as it hit him.

'You fucking snake. Boris Arinofsky… what the hell are you so agitated about?'

A new email chimed. Jacob clicked the message and opened his mail. It was from Rube. The little _sonofabitch_ had sent a flurry of downloadable files. Impressive.

_**Jake, the company's system was corruptible. No trouble. Good stuff. Client and company info. Personal info is unattainable. Restricted entry. Going to need hardware for this one. More $$.**_

Jacob looked at the grouping of files. All were obtained from the Louis M. Lewis Group. It would take time to dig through them. He picked up his cell and dialed Bella.

'What time is it?' she answered.

'Time to get up, Bells… seriously, it's almost noon.'

'Shit. Joseph's memorial is in an hour. I never sleep this late.'

Jacob snorted. 'Joseph's?'

'Sorry… I don't know,' Bella stammered.

'Well, listen, I've got good news and bad. How do you want it?'

Bella coughed and dryly chewed. It mimicked a cow crunching away on its cud.

'That's disgusting. Is that what I sound like?'

'Give me a sec, Jake,' rustling sounds and static, the fridge door closing, gulping and a breath, 'alright, hit me.'

'I like your style,' he smiled to himself. Jacob cleared his throat. 'First. I think you're going to like this. The brownstone on 5th belongs to… of all people, Ray Frecsho. The White House Press Secretary. Apparently, Ray comes from a very wealthy family. I did a little digging. His father was Salvador Frecsho, a very successful investment banker. He coined the phrase, "_In money we trust… God can ride the bus." _Fucking infamous,' he chuckled, 'anyway… he made a fortune in the eighties and early nineties. Piggybacking on the rise of the economy under Reagan and Clinton. We're talking hundreds of millions, Bells. One of the all-time greats. Cover of _Fortune_… all that shit. He purchased the building back in the mid-nineties. Got it when property values were plummeting, before the bubble hit. Now… from what I gathered, little Raymond wasn't such a good student. He was dropped from two different academies before winding up at St. Bard's. Old Sal greased some palms, did some major contributing to a certain Democratic nominee in '91 and '92, and _la dee dah,_ Ray was accepted to of all places Oxford… a certain former president's alma mater. Now he suddenly winds up as the current administration's media tamer. Coincidence? Which brings us to Lewis. Guess who else attended St. Bard's?'

'Lewis,' she breathed.

'They graduated together. It would appear Frecsho and Lewis aren't only consociates. They're alumni consorts. But I have a feeling there's something more going on. Now... Frecsho's wife, Candice, uses the brownstone most of the time. While he's busy in Washington, she's busy here in the city. I'm assuming, and it isn't much of an assumption, that by busy she's most conceivably getting her ass balled by your friend Lewis.'

'Holy shit!'

Jacob chuckled. 'Interesting choice of words. I also found the identity of the older man in your photo. I recognized him from a piece a few months back in the Times. He's Boris Arinofsky. The newly appointed Russian ambassador for the U.N. He was KGB. Intelligence. A fuckin political hero during the Cold War. It strikes me odd these two would have some kind of a relationship. Unless Lewis is branching out his political ties. Personally, I think he's some kind of a middle man. I don't know what your boy is up to, but it won't be long before we find out.'

'What about my mother? Did you find out anything about my mother?'

'I really don't know yet, Bells. I've got a bunch of files to dig through. I'm passing them on to you right now,' he said forwarding the email. 'It seems Lewis has been very busy.'

'So what's the bad news?'

'If you want this guy, it's going to cost. The kid needs more money.'

'How much?'

'Another five thousand.'

'Jesus.'

'I know. You might want to think hard about this, Bella. Let's see what we can find through his business. I have my doubts, though. All this shit is probably going to be pretty clean. We know he's dirty… but he's no dummy.'

'Okay.'

'Alright. Let me know the play. It's your call.'

'Thanks Jake.'

Jacob lit another smoke and set down his cell. He thought about the first time he'd met Bella Swan. She was only seventeen at the time. Green. Beautiful. Not an ordinary city girl. Her aura seemed infectious. She had stalked him for over a month trying to get his attention. He smiled to himself in retrospect.

Bella had been relentless. Everywhere he went she was there waiting for him. The shitty dives he frequented. The NY Public Library. Even the garage he worked at to be alone. He assumed she was another groupie on a witch hunt. Some bloodsucker with the hopes of achieving stardom by unveiling his past and parlaying it into something viable. He couldn't shake her.

At the time he'd called her every name in the book. A Bitch. Cunt. Whore. Slut. …A fucking felangio _(a handjobber of the lowest order)_. Scab. Loser. Freak. He told her she was talentless and had no future… that her writing was complete shit. He'd even threatened to have her arrested, toying with the idea of filing a restraining order. But she kept coming. She was unyielding. That was when he finally let her in. She had broken him down.

He remembered the shine of her eyes. Browns and yellows like the sun melding into a settling field at dusk. They had breathed new life into him. Possibly a godsend. Now he'd do almost anything for her. Her wellbeing often crept its way into his thoughts. He might even love her.

_I'm so fucked_, he thought. The girl in his bed fumbled in the wake of tangled sheets and mumbled something. Jacob exhaled. He finished his beer and opened a new one and took a long gulp and then filled it level with tomato juice. Lewis' business reentered his mind. He clicked on the first file and opened it.

_So hotshot… what are you hiding?_


	15. Saint Michaels

Saint Michael's was a beautiful church inside. Great plaster columns touched its ceiling bordering the rows of dark-stained pews. The perimeter was surrounded by paled statues of the archangel St. Michael and other divine guardians. The windows were all domed and arched and crafted of exquisite stained glass, depicting stories from the bible – the Nativity, the Crucifixion of Christ, the Last Supper. Positioned at the very front of the church was a large statue of Our Lady's Prayer and a painted Jesus in a blue and white robe, holding the word of God, his golden halo hovering divinely.

The service had already begun when Bella slipped through the tall wooden doors of the church. She moved to the back under the lofted gold and brass-finished organ resting in the wing above her. The pews were full and it was quiet except for the orator posed at the pulpit reading a passage from the scripture. Bella walked across the back and came as close to the first column as the colored light strewed from the window would allow. As if stepping into the light might expose her loss of faith in anything sacred. The church held the strong aroma of time, as they often do.

It had been three years since she had entered a church. Oddly enough, almost to the day. When her father had passed she was still a teenager, granted, she was only months away from shedding her teens, and she clearly remembered the resentment she'd adopted as a result of her father's death. Her prayers hadn't been answered. Nor were her mother's. This forced her to question if anyone's ever were. It seemed to reason with all the tragedies in the world, where did God stand. Was it all part of His plan? Was everyone just supposed to hope for the best? The slaughtering of tens of thousands in Rwanda. The killing of baby girls in China. The murder of women and children in Tibet. Syria. Libya. Colombia. Venezuela. The holocaust. These kinds of events have plagued the earth for centuries. Events responsible through men of power, and yet, God saw fit not to intervene. He, who is all knowing and all powerful, chose silence over compassion.

Over the next several months she had pondered these questions and then one day she woke in the early hours before dawn and decided that if God wasn't going to help the ones who couldn't help themselves she would. No matter the cost. She considered how naïve she might be. She understood that ignorance lies within youth. But she had to stand up because her heart had told to do so. It was the ultimate reaction of her shattered faith.

Now she wondered if she really was losing her soul. In a way she had come to St. Michael's in order to get closer to the boy's grieving mother. Hoping for something, anything, which might aid her. It was more self-serving than anything. It made her feel dirty to think about it. Even if her intentions were noble.

Bella watched the memorial proceed and removed the knitted cap from her head, freeing her straight black hair. Unexpectedly, her dark hairstyle had complemented her fair complexion more than ever. From the other side of the church a charming man stood at the end of the last pew casually watching her. As soon as she looked in his direction he turned his attention to something else. Bella looked away and then back again and realized it was the guy from the Medical Examiner's Office. It was Edward Cullen

She watched him on and off. He appeared healthier than the first time she saw him. His hair and face stoic in the gray scattered light. It was obvious he was here because of the boy.

Toward the front of the church came the gentle sounds of weeping from the pews. It was distinct and muffled and railed between the breaks of verse being read. They had held it in as long as they could and their expressions were purely heartfelt. In the very front Joseph Mackenzie's mother sat silent.

Bella waited for Edward to look in her direction again but he didn't. Then she saw that he was actually watching a young girl sitting in one of the pews. When she turned her gaze to the girl they suddenly made eye contact. The girl had been watching her the whole time. Bella quickly looked down and then slowly back to the eyeing, scrawny girl.

Sitting at the end of a pew near one of the columns was a young teenage girl. Hands crossed, hunched forward in the pew as she turned to look back. She wore a loose, V-neck sweater and a strand of large black pearls tightly choked around her throat. The girl's face was paled and plain and reminded her of raindrops freckling over a dusty pane of glass. Bella watched the girl intently. She immediately became lost in the girl's face.

_She's_ _different_, Bella thought. The one thing that stood out more than anything was the girl's flamboyant hair. She had lengthy, shagged hair, as if cut from a pair of rusty, dulled shears and yet it was the most beautiful hair she had ever seen. Bella didn't know why but she suddenly got a warm feeling that reminded her of her mother.

**Later…**

It was two-thirty when Bella drove through the Lincoln Tunnel and headed south on the New Jersey Turnpike. The Camaro grumbling away beneath her seemed to help her thoughts navigate the bird's nest of questions she had. She didn't have the heart to speak to Joseph Mackenzie's mother, if that's what you want to call it. _Wrong place, wrong time. Was there a possibility the mother may have forgot to tell something of value to the police? Possibly, but not very likely. Anything might have helped, though_. As she recalled it was usually the tiniest and most insignificant details that unraveled everything and brought it all to light. She had also wanted to approach the man from the morgue, Edward Cullen. He had left before the memorial was over and she hadn't even seen him leave. This left her pondering what he knew and of what value they may be to each other. She would do a background check on Edward Cullen and determine his worth. She could most likely find everything she needed in the city records. If not, there was always Jacob.

She exited the turnpike onto John F. Kennedy Blvd. and drove south through the small city of Bayonne, New Jersey. When she passed the City Park she turned onto 3rd Ave. and parked in the spacious lot of the Chelsea Center. Just as she had thought, the place looked like an expensive resort. Rolling spans of green lawn. Trees mixed with shrubs and an array of flowering plants, beautifully crafted into the landscape. Manmade ponds. Tennis courts. Shuffleboard. A golf course. It could've easily passed for a posh country club.

Bella crossed the lot and headed for a large Spanish-stone vestibule with a magnificent fountain in the center when a golf cart pulled alongside her and an older gentleman honked the horn.

'Would you like a lift, young lady?' the man smiled. He palmed and smoothed his silvered hair across the part above his right ear like an elderly James Dean.

'That's okay. I don't want to trouble you,' Bella shook her head.

'No trouble. I'll drive you to the front,' the man waved her toward the seat.

'Okay,' Bella smiled.

When they reached the main building the man let her off and smiled and winked as he drove away. Bella nodded and softly waved and entered the main lobby of the Chelsea Center. It was grandiose to say the least. Marbled floors. Roman pillars reaching out to support a vaulted glass ceiling. Palms and ferns absorbed the gray light from above, covering the scope of the lobby like a globed terrarium. At the far end was a limestone waterfall, water rushing down against the jagged stone and into a fountain of aquatic plant life below.

She crossed the lobby and stopped in front of a long pearled and granite reception desk. People were being helped with an unusual efficiency. A stout woman waddled from the other end of the desk. The woman stood typing against a large touchscreen monitor before turning her attention to Bella. She smiled and waved.

'Hello, my name is Sandy. Can I help you with something?'

'Yes. My mother was recently transferred from the trauma ward in East Side Hospital. It was a few days ago. I… I don't know where they moved her to. I'd like to visit her,' Bella smiled uncomfortably.

'Of course. What's your mother's name?' The woman led her down to the touchscreen monitor.

'Renée Swan.'

The woman typed and pulled up her file. 'It says here, she is to be monitored closely and no guests are allowed for visitation. It says she has no immediate family.'

'What?' Bella shook her head in disbelief and leaned across the desk to view the monitor. 'She's my mother… she's in a coma for Christ sake… this is ridiculous.'

'I'm sorry… I really can't help. It appears an injunction was filed during the transfer from East Side Hospital. Probably through whoever's care she was in… You're going to have to take the matter up with them.'

_That bastard_… Bella gritted. She was sure Louis M. Lewis had raided her mother's estate making wealthier in the process. Now he'd blatantly separated her mother from her life… she suddenly realized he was playing with her. Not only did he want the money, he wanted her as well. Her narrow face flushed, freckling down the curve of her fair throat.

'I really am sorry. If it's any consolation, she is in Dr. Hoffman's care. He's one of our best. Just know your mother is being given the best possible treatment.' The words the husky woman spoke were sincere.

Bella ran her hands over her eyes and pushed back her dark hair and shook her head.

'Thank you,' she mechanically nodded. She turned and fished out her cell and headed for the exit.

Jacob's number rang and immediately went to voicemail. 'Jake… let's do it.'


	16. Greenville

_The small town of Greenville shined like distant satellites across the shadows of the open valley below. Jimmy Dryler sat with his back to the rocky bluff and looked out over the town at dusk. He thought about the stories of the ancients who crossed this land and settled and passed on. Like translucent beings weaved among the trees and wheat and tall amber grasses of the valley. Their very souls shifted as visions on the wind. Moving with the earth. He remembered what his grandfather had once told him… how time stood still for the solitary man. Maybe that's what he'd felt when he was alone in the mountains. _

_The boy gathered the dry sticks and billets of wood and carefully placed them into a neat stack. Pyramiding them in the center of the shaved, rocky ledge. So that he filled the center with weeds and carefully pitched the wood around the pyramid until a small wooden teepee was formed. The sky darkened and blooded and bled against the clouds, shifting them into great black sails that passed stealthily through the night. He removed a box of kitchen matches from his pocket and opened the slide and removed one and struck it against the side of the box. The sting of sulfur filled his nose. He held the match to the fluff of dry foliage near the bottom of the stack and let it catch and drip and smoke beneath. Crackling. Spreading like long shifting claws within the pockets of slender wood._

_He slid close and blew on the small flame and brushed the dark smoke into the night. There are certain things that hold themselves eternal. They are as they have always been. Never changing. Perfected from conception and living neither without sign nor mind of its own existence. _

_Jimmy watched the fire breathe and grow, his tussled dirty hair moving with the wafts of dry heat. He placed more sticks among the pile and slid back and crossed his legs in front of the fire he had created. He would sleep here tonight. Near the warmth. Where he knew he'd be safe._


	17. 4 Train

Saul Bukowski had been working the night shift for fourteen years. Every night he was picked up in Brooklyn at midnight and then he conducted the 4 Train through the early morning hours. Running it all the way to Van Cortlandy Park and back. Almost a straight line right through Manhattan to the Bronx. The best part was he enjoyed the late nights. Not much happened late at night. Occasionally, something went wrong; a commuter would cause a commotion or was too drunk and hostile and the transit cops needed to be brought in. Once, two men decided to knife each other and bled all over the seats and floors and windows. It was a horrorshow. They both whined and carried on like a pair of manic invalids. They lived and were taken to the hospital and stitched-up and arrested. But for the most part, he could count on it being quiet. As far as he was concerned he had the best job in the city.

November 3rd was a Thursday. The usual. Saul had been up watching boxing before his shift. It ended on a good note. Split Decision. A new featherweight champ was given the belt. Another Mexican from west Texas. He kissed his wife as she lay passed out on their sofa and grabbed his sack lunch and thermos and headed down to the station. He had a feeling it was going to be a good night. Like the comfortable sensation one gets after a satisfying meal.

Saul opened his thermos and poured a small coffee into a paper cup and sipped it back. He was midway through his shift when he decided to break for lunch. Usually, he didn't last that long but he had stuffed himself during the boxing match and now he was starving again.

The train had just made its last stop in the Bronx and was headed back to Manhattan when Saul ripped into the cellophane wrapping from his small spiced cakes. He stuffed a whole cake into his mouth and breathed crumbs as he slowly chewed. Mt. Eden stop. 170th Street. 167th Street. Then Yankee Stadium. The train went around a bend and headed down the tunnel into Manhattan. Saul looked up from his second cake as he crammed it into his mouth. Reddened shadows. Dancing ceremoniously in the span of light. Like some gypsy apparition of souls scrambling in failed escape from the pits of hell.

_Dear Christ! _Saul choked on his cake, the burn of asphyxiation deep in his throat. Desperately quaffing for air. Thoughts of his wife… asleep where he left her. She had always warned him not to eat them whole. _Jesus, Betty Jane…_

A ragged, blood-soaked man stormed wildly down the tracks toward the oncoming train. Fleeing into the depths of the train's light. Eyes paled and bulging and moonlike among a flaming sky. Wet pastry sprayed the controls and glass as Saul pulled on the brake. A sudden, blunted thud. Blood splattered the front glass and lights. Moving in cruel flowered patterns against the dull glass. Saul took a birthed deep breath. The train screamed and hissed along the tracks as it braked and slowly rolled to a deadened stop. Saul pivoted away from the control panel and wiped the tear streaks from his swollen face.

_What do? What do?_ He'd read that in a book once. It was like the sound of birds inside his head, he remembered. He fumbled for the radio and slid back against the door and down to floor of the train. His legs and crotch were damp. Saul looked down and realized he had pissed himself.


	18. Columbia School of Journalism

It had been over a week since Bella had spoken to Jacob. Even longer since she had seen her mother. She had become increasingly worried she was never going to see her again. It was slowly beginning to feed on her. Her dreams had become disturbingly vivid. She was suffering from sleep deprivation. More than usual, anyway. Her weight had dropped. So much, in fact, she used the bathroom one night and flinched at her reflection, thinking someone else was in her apartment. Her frame had tightened, making her appear wiry and starved. She'd also developed dark rings under her eyes. She felt as if she were transforming into something hideous and outside of herself.

Lewis had left the city and gone to the Hamptons in his yellow Ferrari. She'd been wrong about the color. For five days she had followed him. She learned he spent a lot of time at a high-class strip club called Livingston's. More often than not, he would leave with one of the girls. Mostly platinum blondes. They were all sleek and tanned and built like thoroughbreds. He also frequented the Rainbow Room and The Four Seasons among other well-known establishments. He spent a lot of time downtown. He visited Rikers Island once… probably a client. She couldn't be sure. She also noted he hadn't revisited the brownstone on 5th Ave. She did a records search and found his living quarters were a penthouse on Park Avenue. It appeared Lewis was turning out to be a player, in more ways than one.

Since attending the University of Florida, an odd choice for a St. Bard's graduate, Lewis went on to study law at Harvard and passed the bar on the first go-round. Nothing special there. But then he was picked up by a small firm in Chicago. Special clients only. High profile. Millionaires with political ties. Something wasn't right and Bella had always known it. Lewis had become affiliated with organized labor and certain institutions gunning for the shakedown of the banking industry and private equity. Within two years out of law school he had become a millionaire and received a budding reputation as a ruthless mercenary of corporate law. She was sure he was part of a network. She just didn't know how far the roots stretched. Three years later he moved to Manhattan and started his own firm. This it seemed was just the tip of the iceberg.

Bella spent early mornings going through the files Jacob had stored in her computer. She found they were mostly client information and processing reports. Billing and such. Jacob was right, not really much of any help. She had located her mother's file and discovered that her instincts were right. Her mother's estate had been pilfered and three million dollars was transferred into a separate account. A business account set up under her mother's name making her one of the minor investors in a division of some new company. An obvious ruse. It was most likely an LLC set up on paper and paper alone. Lewis could pull the funds any time he wanted. He was probably storing all of his dirty money in the company. In the meantime, she'd wired the money from her trust over. She hadn't heard back in ten days. Nothing. She was beginning to lose patience. The clock was ticking. She hoped she would find out soon enough.

She crossed the campus' South Field and passed the statue of Thomas Jefferson and climbed the steps of Journalism Hall. Classes were already through for the day. The sky was going dull and gray. The smell of winter in the air. She entered the building and marched down the hall and headed for Professor Rice's office. When she reached his office she knocked on the door and waited. Nothing. She knocked again. Then she just opened the etched wooden door and stuck her head inside.

'If someone doesn't answer, I believe it means they don't want to be disturbed,' a voice said from the back of a leather chair.

'Hello Professor Rice.'

'Miss Swan,' he said surprised. He spun around in his chair to face her. 'What an honor, I'm assuming… and as a rule, one must never assume.'

'Yes. May I come in?'

'But of course. Maybe you can explain to me why one of the best students I've ever had is in serious danger of losing their fellowship,' he cocked his head as he spoke.

'That's what I wanted to speak with you about,' she said entering the darkened office.

'Please.'

Bella moved to the front of his desk. 'I don't…'

Rice raised his hand and curiously looked her over. The girl who had once been soft and bright and full of light was now a dark shell of herself. 'Whatever you've gotten yourself into, I'd suggest you rethink. You've obviously changed your hair and your appearance is shockingly gaunt. I would almost say ghastly, but I have neither the intention nor desire in offending you. Nothing wrong with presumption. However, I get the feeling you are putting yourself in some kind of serious danger. Am I correct?'

She nodded.

'I thought so. Would you like to explain?'

'No,' she shook her head. 'I don't know. Things have gotten… complicated. I have a family issue to deal with and something has to give,' she squinted in the faint light peeling away across the floor of the room.

'I see. No favors.'

'I'm sorry.'

'So am I. But it isn't going to be that easy, Bella. I'm not giving up on you. I will not beg and I will not abandon you. Take the required time you need. I can pull some strings. That is, of course, what tenure was intended for. I could care less about the board. If they had one creative, rebellious bone in their bodies they might see that rules only exist to be abandoned.'

Bella smiled. 'Thank you Professor Rice.'

'We'll be in touch, Bella. Remember, you must have the proof.'

'Of course,' she nodded.


	19. Therapy

The office was bright and cramped. There was a metal desk with a faux laminate top. Filing cabinets. Framed diplomas. A desktop computer. No pictures of friends or family. No sense of personal warmth. There were two small windows in each of the corners facing the street. A plastic plant rested beside the door.

Edward sat in a stiff wooden chair and stared down at the scattered stains spotting the cheap, blue carpeting at his feet. They were the remnants of washed away blood. Clearly self-inflicted. _God knows why._ This was nothing like the fancy offices the psychiatrists kept in films and on television. It felt more like something a guidance counselor might occupy. Maybe that's why Edward was so agitated. He wanted to burn the place to the ground.

The metal door to the office opened. A woman with amber hair and casual attire entered and moved around Edward and sat down behind the desk. She was plain except for her gray eyes and the patterns of freckles circling her cheeks and forehead and throat. She set a file down before her and opened it and looked up at Edward.

'Hello Mr. Cullen. I'm Maureen Tatum. I'll be your counselor for the duration of our meetings. I want you to feel as comfortable as possible… so if you need or want anything, let me know.'

Edward nodded.

'May I call you Edward?' she said thumbing through the paperwork in the file.

Edward nodded.

Maureen Tatum looked up and watched the jaded young man sulk. 'You're going to ride me all the way on this, aren't you?' she frowned.

Edward shifted in his chair. 'What do you want from me?'

Maureen shook her head. 'I don't want anything from you, Edward.'

'Everyone wants something.'

'Maybe…'

Edward was amused. 'No maybes about it.'

'Okay then, I'd like you to tell me why you're here?'

'I have to be.'

'Yes. But why do you think you're here?'

'Because people like you fabricate their ideals and push them on the rest of us in order to keep their job relevant.'

'Fair enough. Did you stop to think there may be chance I can help you.' Her eyes darkened. They were the color of dirty snow. They were beautiful.

Edward leaned forward toward the desk. 'Surprise me,' he smirked.

'Tell me about your brother, Jasper.'

Edward reclined and massaged the thin wood of the armrest with his fingers. He looked away and then watched her like an animal caught in a trap. Full of defensive resentment.

'What about your sister, Alice? How is she holding up?'

'She's gone.'

'Where?'

Edward sighed. 'She went to live with my other sister… Washington, I think.'

Maureen leaned back, her posture easing. 'Do you miss her?'

Edward watched her. He traced the contour of her cheekbone and jaw with his eyes. 'Where's your family? I didn't see any photographs or cheesy knick knacks children make and proudly give away for their parents to display.'

'I don't have a family,' she said shaking her head.

'Why not? Are you a lesbian?'

Maureen tilted her gaze and smirked. 'No. Does it matter?'

'You just enjoy dealing with fucked up cops…'

'Not exactly. I'd like to think I help some of the men and women who sit where you're sitting right now.'

Edward looked down at the stains at his feet. He could still smell the blood. 'What about this guy? It doesn't appear he faired too well.'

'Jesus…' she frowned. 'Are you as messed up as you look? Because from where I'm sitting, I see a man who's in way over his head!' The fire in Maureen's eyes suddenly exposed an attractive quality previously hidden.

'Maybe,' he grinned.

Edward's cell rang. He fished it from his coat. 'I have to take this.'

Maureen nodded. Her freckled skin had flushed and she exhaled with some sense of warranted relief.

'Yeah,' he said flipping open the phone.

It was Tiresa Cruz. She was a dark-haired, steely-eyed Staff Sergeant that worked under Captain Burns. A sultana of a woman. Half Puerto Rican and half Samoan. Raised by her brothers, three of which who were doing time at Riker's. She could easily kick half of the guy's asses in SID if she chose to. She also had a blatant distaste for Bill Cunnings. Edward had a soft spot for her for that and she knew it. That was part of the reason they worked so well together. She held things together in the Missing Persons Unit of SID.

'Cullen… we just got the report in on the guy that dove in front of the Lexington Green Line this morning. Sent over from the 100th. He was reported missing over a week ago. His name was Jay Harvey… white male, 33 years of age, he's got a record… petty larceny, shoplifting… two-time sexual predator. He was arrested in April of '98 for exposing himself to a young boy in New Rochelle. Served six months. In 2011 he was busted propositioning some boys outside a middle school in Mount Vernon. The charges didn't stick, but he made the list.'

'Pedophile…' Edward looked back to Maureen as he said the word. Her face had returned to its milky resonance.

'I'd say so. NYPD found a vehicle belonging to an Edna Van Wynn abandoned near the reservoir in Central Park East. She's Harvey's grandmother… she's the one who reported him missing. Apparently, he squats in her basement in Mount Vernon.'

'How do you know?'

'She told us.'

'Sounds about right… who else is on this?' Edward looked at Maureen and made a writing gesture with his left hand. She nodded in acknowledgment and slid a pen and pad across the desk.

Tiresa cleared her throat. 'Excuse me… So far, Clemente has stepped in and decided to tie this to the Mackenzie case. The feds are getting involved; he really has no choice in the matter. I don't think he wants to be left hanging in the wind. They've put him and his team on the backburner… I think he's getting desperate. None of his informants are talking, even with the shakedowns. They're scrambling for anything. He thinks this Harvey may be responsible for some of these missing boys. He's going to have a go at it.'

'Bullshit…' Edward sighed, 'the boy wasn't molested. He was tortured.'

'I don't know… this guy goes missing for a week and ends up in the tunnel running down the track into an oncoming train. The conductor said he was covered in blood before he hit the train. Said Harvey was bleeding from his eyes… bleeding from everywhere. Sounds questionable. Could be drugs… he could be trafficking. He might have owed money. You know how these things go. You want to check it out?'

Edward picked up the pen and thanked Maureen with his eyes. 'Give me the address.'

**Later…**

The yellow house on Sidney Street in Mount Vernon was weathered and beaten. Dull yellows had chipped away and left a speckled undercoat of what was once maybe an exterior white. The porch sagged and the roof appeared darkly stained from years of heavy snow and hot summers. Shingles hung loose and some were scattered around the weedy yard and base of the old house.

Edward crossed the front walk and climbed the porch steps. He carefully opened the wonky screen door and stepped onto the dirty beams of porch. There were stacks of old wood planks, cobwebbed and dusted and infested. An array of dead plants, their stems withered and clawed like decayed fingers. A bamboo chime hung half-strung and unevenly weighted. He rang the bell and then followed with a firm knock above the deadbolt. Nothing. Edward knocked again and listened. Light footsteps shuffling along.

'Ms. Van Wynn… could you open your door please? My name is Edward Cullen… I…' he looked around at the entombed porch and dirtied windows, 'I need your help, Ms. Van Wynn.'

The bolt cracked and unlocked and then the door slowly swung open and heavily bumped against the inside wall. A small, hunched woman in Easter-blue shorts and dirty stockings stood in the doorway in her brassiere smoking a long cigarette and eating Oreo's from her hand. Her face was spotted and pinched and she looked upon Edward with questionable malice.

'The police have already been here,' she spoke flatly, 'and I don't know why my grandson jumped in front of a God awful train.'

'Of course.'

'So, what do you want?' she chewed, her teeth black and smeared with cookie, smoke trailing from her nostrils.

'I'd like to have a look around your home.'

'What for? They already took the computer and some boxes of his things… don't make no sense to me.'

'Just the same, I don't work with those men. I work alone.' Edward looked through her to the inside of the house. Piles of clothing in swollen trashbags around the doorjambs. Old magazines. Books. Mason jars filled with loose change. Unrecycled soda bottles in their tattered cardboard cases. _Tab… 7up… pepsi free_. It was endless. A hoarder came to mind.

'Hmmm… there was a woman with the ones that were here before.'

'Of course.'

'She was unpleasant. Had no decency for a grieving old woman,' she coughed and swallowed hard. The light coming through the doorway cast upon the particles of dust floating through house. 'When do I get my car back?'

'Soon.'

She looked Edward over and stepped back away from the entryway. 'Well… go on then.'

'Thank you.'

Edward slipped by the old woman and crossed through the front hall of the house. Yellowish-brown walls. The house stunk of stale tobacco and musk. There was a layer of dust coating everything. A television garbled voices somewhere in the back. He stepped over the piles of clutter and squeezed through the small kitchen. Old raisin-spotted flystrips hung from the ceiling. He moved around them and went down the cellar steps into the basement.

The old woman's voice trailed from somewhere in the house. '_This ain't no Holiday Inn.'_

'Jesus…'

The first thing to hit him was the smell of stale cat piss. It was toxic. Edward rubbed at his burning nostrils and breathed through his mouth. The basement was a wreck. He couldn't tell where Clemente's men had searched or not. Edward looked around. The walls were fibered-wood overlay. A few random posters. Comic heroes. Japanese Anime. Sci-fi movies… _Blade Runner… Planet of the apes… Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory_. The floor was carpeted. Dirty-spotted pink carpeting. There was an old desk. A small dresser with the drawers emptied onto the floor. A convertible sofa. Recliner. Microwave stand with a television and DVD/VCR combo resting on it.

In the front corner was a rusted weightbench with loose weights stacked by the base. Some shelving previously covered with books and movies and personal treasures, now scattered along the pissy carpet. Stacks upon stacks of comics sealed in plastic. A cat's skull eating a rat's skull. A _Pyramid _puzzle. Ceramic figurines. No litter box in sight. No cat for that matter. Edward moved the cat skull with his shoe.

He navigated through the trashed basement and peered into the darkened back room behind the stairs. It looked like the upstairs. Dust, thick and dark and webbed. Crates of empty soda bottles. A dirty birdcage. Bassinette. Stacks of comforters. Old packages of ear cleaners and cotton balls. Boxes on boxes of stale clothing and magazines and books. Some of them were spilled and emptied over each other. Clemente's people clearly sniffed through most of it.

He moved back over to the desk. Emptied. Any CDs or papers were gone. Everything was clean. Save the assorted office supplies now scattered into a pile on the floor. There was a tin wastecan painted with colored balloons spilled over beside the desk.

Edward squatted and looked over the used squeezes of tissue and candywrappers. The sofa had been pulled out and the yellowed mattress now lay curled in the corner among the cushions. Sheets in a ball. He walked around the perimeter and felt the seal of the carpeting with his shoe. He knelt in the back corner and pulled the carpeting away from the wall. Stained concrete unearthed. He released the carpeting and wiped his hands on his trousers. He stepped into a small room off to the side. Just a sump pump, plumbing and the fuse box.

Edward crossed back to the center of the basement and looked at the articles of junk owned by a dead man. A pedophile. He looked through the movies, mostly Sci-fi, Anime. Books. Some paperbacks… overdue library books, _Nietzsche_… _Dante's The Divine Comedy_… _Aldous Huxley's Heaven and Hell_.

_He appeared to want to prove something_. Edward thumbed through the rest of the crap. There was nothing here. No nudey magazines. No pornography. No photographs of any kind. What's more there was no secret cell or dirty hole hidden away somewhere in the depths of the earth. Edward shook his head. He thought his place was bad. This place was a shithole. _This guy obviously cared about something more than he cared about himself_. _An idealist seemed a stretch for a sex offender_.

_Where's your special place? _Edward was beginning to feel lightheaded. The strong stench of ammonia fogged his senses. His head had that urging throb he dreaded. He headed for the stairs and looked back at the front wall. He knew this guy held something sacred. It was definitely in his profile. Something he'd want to look at every day to remind himself. Most people kept their heirlooms in a drawer or jewelry box of some kind. Somewhere accessible and unassuming. Most people… Pedophiles whole existence was to hide. Hiding in plain sight. That was how they preyed on their victims.

Edward exhaled. He listened to the old woman shuffling about above his head. In her decrepit dwelling like some neoteric class of Gollum. He could only imagine the genesis of such a family. Generations of them clawing among the muck. Unformidable in their slanderous ways. Their family tree rooted in squalor and the bloodlet of others. Which suddenly brought back to mind. There weren't any photographs. None… no mother or father, no childhood memories. Maybe there was a cache of old photoalbums stashed away among the filth upstairs. It seemed Jay Harvey showed no signs of sentimentality. He almost felt segregated. Above whatever he considered to be family, at least in his mind.

_He identified with something_… Edward paused. He looked back to the stack of books and then considered the surrounding posters. They rested on the floor along the surrounding walls. He crossed back over to the pile of movies and books and went through them again. It wasn't there.

'There you are…'

Edward went over to the front wall and lifted the_ Willy Wonka_ poster from the ground and removed the thin plastic framing bordering the edges. He peeled away its plexi-shield and pulled the poster from its matte. Underneath were a series of folded white pamphlets. They slid from the backing and floated to the floor like dirty pigeons being released from a rooftop. Edward picked one up and held it by its corners and carefully unfolded it. The cover page was a black and white photograph of a young boy posed like the Statue of David. Edward knew what it was immediately. The slight acidity of bile clung to the back of his throat. He swallowed and looked back to the Caligulous display. It was a circulation for pedophiles.

_The city's number 1 source for enthusiasts. Welcome new members… _it read across the top. At the bottom of the page was a web address. Edward folded up the pamphlet and saw it had been forwarded to the current address. There was no return address.


	20. Renesmee

It was dusk when Bella left Journalism Hall and came out onto Broadway. The sun slowly crossed behind the pallet of buildings to the west. Darkening the streets and leaving the pale wafts of remaining day lingering like laundry hanging from a line.

She went down the steps of the 116th subway and went through the turnstile and headed for the downtown train. The platform was full. People pushing and scrambling within the rush of human traffic. A large, obtrusive man forcefully moved ahead of her, buffaloing his way through the growing crowd. She instinctively followed the charger when he knocked a small girl to ground and kept on moving. Bella halted and turned and knelt next to the shaken girl.

'Are you alright?'

The girl absently looked up at her and blinked.

Bella spun away in anger. 'Hey! You hurt this girl asshole!' she called.

'Va fungool…' the heavy man shot his middle finger as he stepped onto the train without looking back.

Bella turned back to the girl and suddenly noticed her beautiful hair. She looked into the girl's soft eyes and studied her face. Her eyes were dark and sharp, her cheekbones present, a nose, mouth and chin as if masterly carved from a smoothed piece of soapstone.

'Are you okay?'

The girl nodded. 'I'm okay.'

Bella shook her head and watched the girl. She wore a plain white sundress covered in patterned rose blossoms and a pair of worn, blue cowboy boots. The doublestrand of dark pearls were still choked around her throat. The boots looked a size too big. Bella remembered thinking there was something different about the girl.

'You're a very beautiful girl,' she found herself saying aloud.

'You smell nice,' the girl softly snorted. '…lilac roses.'

Bella tilted her head suspiciously. 'That's right. It was my mother's soap. It's very old.'

The girl nodded and moved to her knees. She was soft and thin and moved delicately and with grace, the way nature had instilled in certain creatures. Like a butterfly moving with the wind.

'I'm Bella. What's your name?' she said helping the girl up.

'Renesmee,' the girl humbly spoke.

Bella nodded. 'You were at St. Michael's. At the memorial. We saw each other… I think. Did you know the little boy who was killed?'

The girl slowly shook her head.

Bella didn't know what to make of this girl. The questions she had seconds before seemed to rapidly dissolve. She found herself struggling to recall. 'Uh… are you alone?'

'Yes.'

Bella nodded. 'Okay. Well… I was headed downtown. Do you want to come? I can take you home or…you look hungry… we can get you something… pizza? Chinese?'

The girl shook her head again. 'No. I… I don't eat that kind of food.'

'Okay.' Bella paused. She had been headed downtown in an attempt to visit Joseph Mackenzie's mother. Enough time had passed that she felt she could pry without really intruding. She was hoping to get some insight into the lost boy's world. The loss of a child was a delicate matter. Especially, if he was found the way Joseph Mackenzie had been. Some of the mothers of the other missing boys had been helpful but questionable. They were shattered images of themselves. Struggling with their daily lives except for the thin strand of hope they desperately clung to.

Now, suddenly, things had changed. She didn't want to let this girl go. Something innate and unexpected had taken hold. As if she had inadvertently snared some rare form of chrysalis. Presently, this strange young girl had shifted her priority.

'I have Mac and Cheese at my place. I could make some for you… if you'd like.'

The girl watched Bella like an island native or some extinct species of fowl that had never witnessed such interesting behavior. She turned and began to head toward the stairs leading up to the street.

'Okay.'

Bella followed without even realizing she was being led.

The streets of Harlem had darkened, appearing dirtier among the shadows and light stretching from the bodegas and small restaurants. Loose bits of trash danced and curled around their feet as they walked past the chainlink and girders of fenced-off construction. Workers were still present and some of them turned and watched these strange visions moving through the street. Like visitors from some other world. A light rain began to drizzle, spotting and gradually blackening the street and walks.

They crossed Lexington Ave. and entered Bella's building and climbed the four flights of stairs to the top floor. The girl hadn't spoken a word since they left the station. Bella wondered if she even had a place to stay.

When they reached her apartment she unzipped the canvas knapsack slung over her shoulder and dug through until she pulled her keys and unlocked the door. The door across the hall quietly opened. The girl cocked her head and watched curiously from beside Bella. Through the crack of the door she could see a figure shrouded in a dark-robed gown, the entire self, wrapped and covered by the long sleek fabric. The dark figure mover closer through the widening crack of door. Where there should have been a face was replaced by a smooth, white costume-mask. It appeared ethereal and macabre in the faint light. The only life exposed was the glaze and shine of the eyes searching from within the deep hollows beneath. One of the eyes was a silvery-blue and appeared scaly and greased as a dead fish.

'Hello Mrs. Ellison,' Bella turned.

'Good evening, Bella. How are you, dear?' the voice wisped.

'I'm fine. How have you been?'

'Who's your friend?'

'This is Renesmee,' Bella smiled and looked at the girl. 'Renesmee, this is Mrs. Ellison.'

The girl stood watching the masked figure with a steely gaze. Her dampened hair grazed the top of her hunched shoulders and the short tips on top spiked along her scalp like the comb on a rooster.

'Renesmee. That's a beautiful name.'

Nothing.

'You should speak when spoken to,' the figure said in a low and hushed tone.

The alluring girl didn't flinch.

'You're a strange bird, aren't you? I don't know what to make of your friend, Bella… she seems oddly… familiar.' The masked face tilted and the eyes slid across their dark holes over to Bella.

'Yes. She does, doesn't she?'

'Indeed. Well, I wanted to let you know I'll be going away soon… maybe for good. I'm not certain as of yet.'

'Oh… no,' Bella shook her head. 'I'm sorry Mrs. Ellison. What happened?'

'I'm old, dear. My health is weakening. My ailment is getting worse,' the old woman coughed and cleared her throat.

Bella moved closer to the old woman's door. 'What can I do?'

'You've already done so much. We should have tea sometime… or not,' she paused and turned her gaze back to Renesmee. She breathed heavily. 'The coldness is coming. It'll be winter soon. Good evening, dear. Good evening, Renesmee,' the masked figure quietly moved from within the thin span of light and shut her door.

Bella opened her door and they stepped inside the dark apartment. When she closed the door and flicked on the lights the girl moved close to her and gently touched the back of her hand. Bella felt the sudden tingle of electricity.

'That woman is hiding something,' she whispered softly.

Bella shifted and smiled. 'You mean her mask,' she nodded. 'It's okay, she has leprosy. It's nothing to worry about. It isn't contagious.'

The girl watched Bella's childlike eyes and slowly moved away into the center of the small apartment. She spun with her senses searching the living space. There was an antique sofa. A wingback chair. Coffetable. A small table with a set of chairs. A desk covered with stacks of papers and random books. Textbooks, procedural manuals, etc. On the wall above the desk was a map of New York City with nine red pins randomly scattered around different parts of the city. At the far end of the apartment was a bed resting on metal rails and nightstand against the back wall. Soft blue light from city shone in across the bed and ceiling and floor.

'Make yourself at home,' Bella said dropping the knapsack and removing her black hooded sweatshirt. She went into the bathroom and came out with a folded white towel and handed it to the girl. She moved to the kitchen and took a pot from above the stove and filled it with water and set it on the stovetop.

'You don't have a television,' the girl turned toward the kitchen

'No,' Bella shook her head. 'I don't watch.'

'I like that.'

Bella paused. 'Would you like something to drink? I have soda or milk.'

'Water is fine.' The girl ruffled the towel through her hair and crossed the apartment and looked at the paperwork piled across the desk. She casually thumbed through the stack of papers and watched Bella pour her water from a pitcher into a plastic drinking cup.

'Do you want to call your mom? Let her know you're okay.'

'My mother is dead.'

Bella paused and caught her breath. 'I'm sorry, Renesmee.'

The girl nodded and looked back to the scramble of collected papers. 'What do you do?' the girl squinted.

Bella brought the cup of water over and handed it to her. 'I'm an investigative journalist. Although, lately, I feel more like a fulltime investigator.'

The girl sipped the water and smiled. 'Maybe that's what you really are…'

Bella gave the girl a questionable glance.

'These boys, they all look oddly… similar. Who are they?'

Bella looked at the loose stack of police reports. She had compiled a dossier as thick as her thigh. She moved her hand over them and studied the faces of the young boys.

'They're boys that have gone missing. They were all abducted and never found,' she turned back and faced the girl. 'You think they look alike?'

The girl nodded. 'Very much so. Don't you?'

This statement gave Bella a sudden chill. She did. Why hadn't it ever clicked before? She opened her mouth to speak but couldn't find the words. The sound of boiling water broke the moment and turned her attention toward the stovetop. She jogged back into the kitchen, glancing over her shoulder at the girl.

'Do you live around here?'

The girl shook her head and moved across the apartment. 'Across the river. In the Bronx.' In the corner next to the sofa was a shaped black case. She picked up the black case by its handle and set it on the sofa and thumbed its latches and opened the lid. Inside, lined in red velvet, was a violin. The girl softly ran her fingers over the strings.

Bella stepped in beside her and looked down at the violin. She hadn't opened the case since her mother went into the hospital. The memory of her playing while her mother basked in the rays of a setting sun flashed through her mind. She remembered how the sky had looked like a watercolor. She remembered how her mother had closed her eyes, the movement of her pupils trading away under her eyelids with the sound of the music.

Bella breathed and looked at the girl. 'Do you play?'

The girl nodded. She picked up the instrument and looked it over, holding it out in front of her and studying the lines of its neck and body.

'It's very beautiful,' she said.

'I used to play for my mother,' Bella smiled. 'Not often enough, I guess…' She thoughtfully gazed at the instrument. 'It's funny how we shape our priorities.'

The girl looked into Bella's eyes and hardened. Her heartbeat slowed. It pulsed and traveled through her, the booming filling her ears like the caustic rhythm of tribal bull drums. Renesmee swallowed sweetly and handed the violin over to Bella. The plastic cup she was holding cracked and gave way and fell to the wood flooring, shuddering against the slats and emptying to form a small distinct puddle.

Bella looked at the water and gently touched Renesmee's arm. Smooth and taut like a snake's hide. She saw _The Lake _in Central Park. As if she was standing by its shoreline. The sunlight warming her skin. She could smell the water. The air. It was the place her mother would take her for picnics when she was young. _She was young_. Bella suddenly felt cold. Petrified. She felt the presence of a little boy. His sweet voice lingering on the air. And then came the shrieks of despair.

Renesmee pulled away. 'I have to go.' She moved quickly across the apartment and went to the door and opened it and left. She didn't look back.

Bella eased down to the seat of the couch and cradled the violin in her lap. She suddenly became disenchanted. Her eyes glassed over. She couldn't take her gaze away from the puddle.


	21. Public school 51

Bella stood in the quiet hall of the elementary school waiting for the fifth grade students to break for their lunch. There was an unspoken sentiment when passing through a school. Any school for that matter. As if they were the relative keeper of memories long past. She paced through the hall and looked around. She was surrounded by the artwork of pumpkins and ghosts and witches and goblins. Decorations from Halloween were still pinned to the large orange and blue fiberboards lingering down the length of the long hall. Soon they would be replaced by cutouts of turkey-hands and Pilgrims and Native Americans and yellowed cornucopias overflowing with a variety of vegetables.

Bella moved to the small window of the classroom door and watched the teacher lean against her desk as she spoke to the class. She was a young woman, no older than Bella herself, and she kept her dark hair back exposing her olived skin and Mediterranean features. She caught sight of Bella in the window and softly smiled in acknowledgment. Bella backed away from the door as the children were released and they came pouring into the hallway and headed for the cafeteria. The teacher followed the last little girl to the door and waved Bella in.

'Hello… I'm Andrea Santos,' the teacher smiled.

'Hi. Bella Swan,' Bella took her hand and stepped inside the fifth grade classroom. Instinctively, she examined the inside of the small classroom. Typical fifth grade décor. Desks. A wall with the student's artwork. The founding fathers above the chalkboards. Grammar and mathematical charts, etc. No American flag. The wall at the back of the room had a schoolpicture of Joseph Mackenzie hanging in a small wooden frame. There were pink and blue shaped hearts with colorful messages scribed in them surrounding the photograph. Bella felt her heart sink.

Andrea Santos leaned against the side of her desk and watched Bella move through the classroom. 'Since you're not one of my student's parents, I'm assuming you're here about Joseph.'

Bella turned her attention away from the back wall and nodded. 'Yes. That's right… I'm investigating his disappearance.'

'I've spoken with several of the detectives already…'

'I understand, Miss Santos. I don't want to waste your time… I know how hard this has probably been for you. I just have a few questions of my own, if you don't mind,' Bella crossed back and stood aside of the desk.

Andrea looked at the picture of Joseph and then back at Bella. 'He was a sweet boy,' she smiled softly. 'Quiet.'

'He did well in class?'

Andrea nodded. 'Yes. He was a very good student. One of my favorites.'

'Did he get along with the other students?'

'He was well liked. I never had any trouble from Joseph.'

Bella moved to the wall of artwork and skimmed over the collection of drawings. Trees and birds and families in the park. Buildings. Boats in the harbor. 'Do you know if he was having any trouble at home?'

'No,' she shook her head. 'I don't think so.'

'But you're not sure.' Bella looked back at Andrea Santos.

'When you spend every day with young children you become attuned to their emotions. Children who are having trouble at home usually act out. They bully or shut down. They don't quite understand how to deal with the feelings they're having. Joseph was a happy boy. In my opinion he was very loved and secure.'

'Do you know if there might have been anything else bothering him? Something outside of the home…'

Andrea shook her head. 'Not that I could see. He never appeared to have any troubles. He never came to me in that regard, anyway.'

'Maybe he said something to one of your other students. Someone he trusted.'

'We had a discussion with the class when he first went missing. In fact the principal and vice principal gathered all the classes to inform them of Joseph's disappearance and seek out any information any of the students might have. Nothing came to light.'

Bella nodded. 'I appreciate your time Miss Santos. Thank you.'

Andrea comfortably smiled. 'Please… call me Andrea.'

'Andrea. If you can think of anything… anything at all, please let me know.' Bella gave her a card with her name and cell number on it and walked toward the door.

'Bella…'

Bella stopped and turned back.

'He was late for class one day. He said he tripped and fell in some water near an alleyway and had to go back home and change his pants. He was afraid the other children would make fun of him. It happened right before he disappeared. I… I completely forgot about the incident. It must have slipped my mind with everything going on.'

Bella nodded. 'Did he say where?'

Andrea shook her head. 'No.'

'Thank you Andrea. You've been a great help.' She left the classroom and walked down the hall and exited out onto West 45th Street. Joseph Mackenzie's building was three blocks over. He and his mother and his uncle lived in the Clinton apartment building on West 44th street off of 10th Ave. She knew he walked to and from school every day. Most of the children did.

She walked to the end of West 45th and crossed a busy 10th Ave. There was a Hess station a block up in the center of the intersection. Vehicles pulled in and out, filling the lot and squeezing behind one another waiting for their turn at the gas pumps. Behind the Hess station was two acres of demolished lot. An entire city block. It was sealed off with girders and ten foot high chainlink fencing. Construction had seized and now it looked like an urban wasteland.

Bella walked down a block and turned onto West 44th Street. The buildings were mostly redbrick and they were squeezed together down both sides of the street. Trees lined the sidewalks. The foliage had changed and darkened. Dead leaves agilely floated down the walks and rested on the cars parked along the curb. She walked to the end of West 44th and stopped in front of the Clinton apartment building. It was a five story walkup. Redbrick like the others. Squared air condition window units hung from some of the windows. Rusted and weathered. Water dripped from the units wetting the sidewalk below.

It had been six weeks since Joseph Mackenzie had gone missing. Almost three weeks since he was found. Bella climbed the stairs of the Clinton building to the third floor. The anticipation of meeting the boy's mother began to cripple her nerve. Her stomach tightened. She walked down the hall to apartment 3E and breathed and softly knocked on the chipped green paint of the hardwood door. Voices clamored from somewhere within the walls. There were the thumping of footsteps and some shuffling and then the bolt on the door cracked and the door swung open. An older man stood in the doorway and looked Bella over with an unfavorable glare.

'Well?' he grunted.

Bella faltered. '… Hello. I'm Bella Swan. I was hoping I could speak with…'

'Don't you people ever give it a rest? Can't you just leave well enough alone? My nephew is barely cold…'

'I'm trying to find who did this to your nephew Mr. Amato. There were other boys… just like Joseph. This might happen again to some other family.'

The man hacked in his throat and swallowed. He shook his head and held to the door.

'We already spoke with the police and the detectives and we've given everything we got. If they haven't found this guy by now, they ain't never gonna find him. My sister has had enough…' he began to swing the heavy door shut.

'Wait…' a voice called from inside the apartment. 'It's okay Anthony. Let the young woman in.'

The man huffed and rubbed at the end of his nose and stepped aside, still holding to the door, allowing a narrow passage between himself and the wall. Bella gave a respectful smile and nodded and squeezed by. She walked down the front hall and entered the living space of the apartment. Pictures of Joseph were placed across a mantle at the front of the room. They were mixed with old black and white photographs in aged and tarnished metal frames. Men and women and families collected and dressed in the respectable fashions of a pre-depression era. A 19th century Bersaglieri stood in his uniform with his round wide-brimmed hat, its dark feathers spurring from the right side. Resting under the mantle in the corner was a child's wooden chair with a stuffed snowman in the seat.

Bella cleared her throat. A woman in her late forties sat at a table by the window drinking coffee. She was hardened and matured and appeared gray in the soft light coming through the window. There was a sense of divinity in her stature. Bella got a much different impression than she had from the church. The woman turned away from the window and quietly took Bella in. Her dark eyes said everything.

'Would you like some coffee?'

'Thank you,' Bella nodded.

The woman poured her a cup of coffee from the kettle atop the table and slid it to the place across from where she sat. 'You'll have to excuse my brother. It's in his nature to be overprotective. After my husband was killed he came to live with us. He's been an integral part of our lives. Especially Joseph's.'

Bella crossed the room and sat down across from the woman. 'Of course. It's completely understandable. I hope I'm not intruding, Mrs. Mackenzie.'

The woman softly shook her head and a sad smile crossed her lips. 'Please… call me Marie.'

'Marie. I'm Bella,' she smiled warmly.

The woman watched Bella for a long moment and then she spoke. 'Joseph was a very special boy. I knew the moment he was born he was different… one of God's chosen ones. He was born to serve a very special purpose, Bella. Do you understand?'

'I'm not sure.'

The woman sipped her coffee. 'Being a Catholic has been embraced by my family for many centuries. Long before my great grandfather immigrated to this country. Long before the industrialization and modernization of the world. There was a time when faith was all a family had. It was as much a part of you as the flesh on your bones or the blood in your veins. It was how we survived. My boy is dead because it is His will. Because sometimes we have to know in our hearts this life is more than we can comprehend. Joseph is with God now. I know this as sure as you are sitting here before me. I also know my boy has brought you to me, Bella. Whether you accept it or not, he has found his way to you and now you are here.'

Bella nodded. 'Yes…'

'Good. I hoped you would.'

Bella paused. 'I need your help, Marie.'

The woman smiled with her eyes. 'It is not my help you seek. I am merely a woman who has lost her son. Tragically… yes. But lost, just the same. This is how you would have me see it. Am I correct? This is what you think.'

'I don't think…'

'Then don't. I loved Joseph very much, Bella… more than any one person can place a value on anything in this world. I refused to see my boy when they found him. I did not want to tarnish the memory of who he was, even though I suffered to see him one last time. But he is in here,' Marie pointed to her heart, 'he will always live here until the day comes when we are together again.'

'I understand.'

'I know you do. Your eyes told me when you first sat down. You have suffered loss as well. Sooner or later we all do. What you must understand is that nothing is ever lost. Not truly. We let our senses trick us into believing something is not there because we cannot see it or hear it or feel the tenderness against our own flesh. This is true blindness. Blindness among the departed. Blindness of the soul. When I was a little girl there was a very terrible winter. People were out of work. There was no electricity for days. My sister Lena came down with pneumonia. She was still very young. We had no money. No one had any money. It was a very desperate time for many people. Poverty was the only way. My mother and father and brothers all worked. I was left to care for her. What does a little girl know about a sick child? My mother's family attempted to help, but there was nothing they could do. This, as you might expect, did not end well. It was my first lesson in faith, my dear. If I could have I would have changed places with Lena. She was the baby. She was my sister. I loved her very much,' the woman paused and slid her hand across the table and rested it across Bella's fingers, 'there is no logic to how God works… He has a plan for all of us, even you.'

'I'm so lost,' Bella shook her head.

The woman gently squeezed her hand. 'You are already on the path. You must first learn to forgive. Time will serve you, as it does us all. You will see. Trust in your heart. Trust in God.'

'I'll try.'

'No. You have to believe, Bella. It is the only way. Let go of what you think you know. For I can tell you with all my love, you know nothing.'

Bella watched Joseph Mackenzie's mother and then she looked through the window into the soft sunlight filtering down, blanketing their pairing with an effervescent glow.


	22. Crumbs

Sebastian Crumb sat at his computer humming to _Duran Duran's,_ _The Wild Boys _and typing with the skill of a seasoned stenographer. He'd been adding another layer of encryption to his website to keep out any unwanted snoops, as it was the case, and decided to do some fishing on a teen chat website. He enjoyed how credulous young people could be. Their harping desire for such a need for approval. It was a weakness Crumb exploited with fervor. He chewed at his fingertips while he chatted up a fifteen year old kid named Toby, pretending to be fifteen himself. It turned out Toby was being physically abused by his father because of his persuasion toward some of the other players on his football team.

_Easy pickins_, Crumb thought with a twisted grin. A black and white tabby sashayed and twisted around his bare ankles, meowing through its purrs.

'Yes baby… daddy will feed you in a moment,' he spoke in a feminine phonetic. 'Just let daddy wet his beak…' Crumb was preparing to lure the kid when there was a rapping at his apartment door. He shifted in his seat and closed the lid of his laptop. The knock came again. More insistent this time. Crumb slowly rose and crossed the immaculate room and stared into the peephole.

'Shit,' he said softly. Crumb thought about not opening the door. Making things difficult. In the end he knew they would find him anyway. He unlocked the door and opened it as far as the chain would allow. 'Yes?' he said shaking his hair back.

Edward shifted toward the cracked door and took Crumb in. He was white man in his mid-thirties. Almost six feet in height. His eyebrows were plucked clean and he was neatly shaven. It appeared that he may have been wearing makeup. His hairline was receding and the highlights in his blonde hair feathered over his head and whittled down the length of his neck resting along his shoulders. He stood in a woman's silk robe and watched Edward and shook his hair back again.

'Yes?'

'Mr. Crumb… My name is Edward Cullen. I'd like to ask you a few questions.'

'About what?'

'About Jay Harvey.'

Crumb quickly glanced away and pivoted his head and glared back to Edward. 'Never heard of him.'

Edward pulled the pamphlet from his coat and opened it and showed it to Crumb. 'This is your publication. We traced the online server you use for the website listed at the bottom back to your mother's credit card. This pamphlet,' he folded the papers over and pinched his finger above a printed address, 'is addressed to Jay Harvey…'

'I'm protected by my First Amendment rights. I've already beaten this in court…'

'I'm not here for your sake, Mr. Crumb.'

Crumb snickered and pushed the door closed and unlatched the chain and reopened the door. 'Call me Bastian.'

Edward paused. He realized Crumb wanted to talk. Animosity often simmered below the surface in certain circles. Especially with deviants. It was in their nature. Like the way some species eat their young. And that's just what this was. A species of disturbing proportions.

'Bastian, what do you know about Jay Harvey?'

Crumb sighed and thumbed back the smooth area of skin where his left eyebrow used to be. 'For one he's a raving narcissist. He talks and acts like he's brilliant. Quoting Shakespeare and poetry or whatever new philosophy he's recently read. He isn't, you know? Brilliant. He's a _fuckin _phony…' Crumb lisped when he stressed a word.

'He's dead.'

The black and white tabby curled around Crumbs legs and meowed. He bent and picked the cat up and held it in his arms and kissed it on its head. He looked back to Edward. 'How?'

'He jumped in front of a train.'

Crumb snorted and lightly chuckled as if Edward had told a bad joke. 'How _Avant-garde_ of him.'

'Were you two close?'

'Hardly. He came around from time to time, looking for attention. Bragging about this and that. It was all bullshit… he was bullshit. He always needed _something_. Pills. Cigarettes. Ideas. I rue the day I was introduced to him. I think he was lonely.'

Edward rubbed at his eye and sniffed. The cat seemed to be smiling at him. 'Lonely. When was the last time you saw him?'

Crumb shrugged. 'A couple of months, maybe. He said he'd made some new friends over on the West Side and stopped coming around as much. Thank God. I didn't welcome his visits. He was always prying. Trying to get contacts out of me. I wouldn't have introduced Jay to my worst enemy. He had a way about him. It was… creepy,' Crumb nodded. 'Yeah. He was definitely a strange one.'

Edward pulled a picture of Joseph Mackenzie from his coat and handed it to Crumb. 'Have you ever seen this boy before?'

Crumb shook his head. 'Hmmm… nope.'

'What about Jay Harvey? I know he liked young boys.'

Crumb shook his head again. 'Jay wasn't into _Chickens._ At least from what I knew. He was more into fancying the _Rentboys._'

'Rentboys.'

'Mm hmmm,' he purred like the cat. He silently taunted Edward with each breath and waited for a response but none came. '… Older boys. Thirteen. Fourteen. A lot of them are hustlers. Homeless hustlers. Runaways,' Crumb said nonchalantly.

'He was arrested propositioning some boys in front of a middle school.'

Crumb shrugged and handed the photo back to Edward. 'He never mentioned it.'

Edward looked back to the smiling cat. Its head protruded alone from the fold of Crumb's arm, its body hidden by the loose crinkles of robe. 'About your website…'

Crumb went dramatic and closed the gap between himself and the doorway. 'It's just a community site supporting the literature… there's no pornography… there's nothing illegal about it.'

Edward furrowed. 'It's a virtual private network, Crumb… exchanges are being made. Email. Photographs. Content you're solely responsible for. You know this.'

Crumb sighed and nuzzled his face against the spotted neck of the cat.

'There's a good possibility one of your users may know something about this boy.'

He gazed down into the feline's coat and then he exhaled a slow hiss of air and shook his hair back. 'Benjamin Dirk. He's the one you want. He's well known among the _chickenhawks_. Kind of runs the show. Wicked… _fucker_… He operates a little flea market just outside Hoboken… knickknacks and things. It's called the _Galaxy_, I think… galaxy flea market.'

Edward nodded. 'Okay.'

Crumb smoothed the skin over his right eyebrow. 'Okay.' He gave Edward a nervous hardened glare.

As soon as Edward was on the street he pulled his cell and called his Staff Sergeant, Tiresa. She gruffly answered. 'This better be good.'

'I just talked to Sebastian Crumb. Guy's a fucking deviant of sorts. He's up to something. I think we should set up some surveillance on the guy. I want to know who he's keeping contact with. I have a feeling his inner circle is a plague. We need to infiltrate and monitor his website and his computer, too.'

'It'll have to go through Cunnings. Won't be easy. He's itching to shut you down, you know? Someone captured a video of you jumping into the Harlem River. I heard it's gone viral. It's drawing national attention to the Mackenzie case. The NYPD is scrambling. Causing all kinds of internal conflict. Cunnings is fuming. He said you're an embarrassment to the department.'

'Prick.'

Tiresa laughed. 'I'll talk to the Captain… see what I can do. It's not all bad… Sgt. Clemente got an informant with something to say. Some pusher in Bedford-Stuyvesant. A Puerto Rican called Lil' Itchy. I heard they roughed him up pretty good. Put the kid in the emergency room. Apparently some guy in a drug den wanted to trade a child for a quantity of smack. A young girl. I guess it wasn't the first time. Clemente's jonesing over this case. He said he's following the breadcrumbs and broadening it from the Harvey and Mackenzie cases. Told the feds to go fuck themselves. He's got the Commissioner and the Manhattan DA backing him on this one.'

Edward was quiet.

Tiresa breathed hard through the phone. 'Anyway… thought you should know. You okay?'

Edward rubbed his temples. 'What's Clemente doing with informants in Brooklyn? He's a third-rate cop from the Bronx.'

'Apparently not. The gates are opened on this one. He and his men have been running all over the city knocking down doors and peddling for information. Clemente's old school, Edward. He plays from a different rulebook. Don't underestimate him. These guys are like bulls in a china shop and everyone in the department tends to look the other way. I told you, he even has the DA with him on this.'

'Bulls in a china shop… that'll certainly muddy the waters. Someone might be feeding him this shit.'

'Maybe. His team was handpicked. Could just be a _flyer, _a transfer. One of his men came up from a precinct in South Brooklyn and probably used to work narcotics. He brought his informants with him. Narco's usually keep tabs with their stools. If they're lucky to live long enough.'

Edward rubbed his eyes and forehead. 'Yeah… maybe so. I have a feeling the whole world's going to hell.'

Edward's consciousness spun out of control and then he remembered the striking girl he'd encountered at the medical examiner's office. For a split moment the pain he suffered began to subside.


End file.
